The Hunted
by TSCCS3Fan
Summary: Everything was deemed to be over, but is everything really what it seems? Continuation of Facing No Fate. *Chapter 32 Uploaded*
1. Chapter 1

**Big Boy's ****Restaurant**

**Los Angeles, California**

**August 18, 1985**

* * *

A year had gone by much to the delight of everyone on Earth, and hardly anything seemed out of place to anyone. Every morning people would wake to the rising sun and begin their daily commutes oblivious to their near demise much like their forefathers had done. Only three people were aware of the blessings of the sunrise every morning, and they carried out their lives while blending in with humanity. The year had treated them well with two living together on the road, and the third dating a young computer major in university. To everyone else they were merely three friends that met every Thursday for drinks at the local diner where the youngest friends' finance worked.

Yet the three friends did much more then just meet for drinks once a week in the diner. In the cover of the mindless chatter of dinner patrons they would discuss amongst themselves various means of preventing anything from happening that would call their attention. Anything that seemed out of the ordinary, or a sudden leap in technology were what they were looking for.

Thought for the past few months it seemed as if things had finally died down and were laid to rest. Lately all their plans were put into place, which meant soon there would be no more meetings. One day in the very near future the diner seat would find itself empty on a Thursday afternoon. Lives would be lived, and futures would be made.

"Right," said the youngest of the three. He was around eighteen years old, with a hard-edged feel to him. His clothes, while fashionable for the period, still seemed out of place. There was no exuberance to his appearance, everything he wore was minimalistic, no outrageous hairstyles or customized sneakers. The boy was very inordinately ordinary.

"Good, we'll be ready to go soon too," replied the other, slightly older, male. This young man came across as a very hard edged person on the eyes, mostly due to the duel scars running down the left side of his temple. They converged on each other to create one single jagged scar in the middle of his left cheek before trailing down and disappearing above his mouth.

He was about to add something more to the conversation before he was cut off by the approach of a waitress from his rear. A very kind looking woman in her late teens or early twenties with bouncing sandy blonde hair, she walked up to their table and immediately locked eyes with Kyle.

"Can I get you guys anything else?"

"Uh, I'm good," Kyle said, lowering his arm from the top of the booth and sitting up straight, "How about you two?"

A smile came over the waitress' face while the girl seated next to the older young man spoke up for them.

"No, we're good to go," the girl turned her head and smiled up towards the woman awaiting their order, "Thanks again, Sarah."

"Aww," Sarah tapped the seated girl on the shoulder gently, "No problem, Cameron."

Sarah started to turn before halting and turning back to the seated trio. They looked slightly surprised that she hadn't left, but very keen on listening to what she had to say regardless.

"Kyle, uh. Dinner at my place?" she asked nervously, trying not to break her eyes away from Kyle's face.

John coughed slightly to clear his through, chuckling to himself under his breath as he did. It was something that both Kyle and Cameron noticed, though only Cameron saw fit to slightly grip his thigh beneath the table. The grip alone was enough to send most people howling in pain, though John had gotten used to it by now.

"Actually do you mind if we go out? I think Ginger will drive me insane again if I come over," Kyle said with a halfhearted smile.

"Of course," Sarah replied with a brighter smile, "she can be a little trying at times." She turned and began walking over to another patron's table unable to hear the obscenity that Kyle mumbled under his breath.

"Ginger's not so bad," the older looking young man said with a grin, "at least not from what mom told me of her back in the day."

"Yea?" Kyle asked sarcastically, "you should see her now, John. Prancing about the apartment like a pixie on cocaine the entire time she's awake," Kyle used two of his fingers to illustrate her dancing by flailing them about on the surface of the table, "She keeps a headset on constantly. I honestly don't see how she's not deaf, and its so loud that it is impossible not to freak her out every time you come up on her."

"It can't be _that_ bad," John scoffed.

"Every time I come up on her I scare the living daylights out of her. It's like she's seen a ghost or something," Sarah giggled to herself before setting off to take someones order. Kyle retorted to her remark with a scoff of his own.

Neither of them noticed the freeze happening to Cameron. The shut down of unneeded functions; a carefree observation of the pigeons outside the big boy restaurant, simulated breathing, and even some forms of her processing features.

_Ghost; entity, spirit, a person previously living, from the past having never moved on. Access: from the past, similar data indicated...Retrieving. _

_ File index: 0943761864535 – Stark, Myron._

"Cam?" John nudged her shoulder again, causing her to snap from her daze, "Cam, come on its time to go."

Cameron nodded and stood, allowing John room to exit the booth seat. Kyle gave a wave and wink to Sarah who was taking up another person's order, and the trio made their way down the row and to the door of the restaurant.

When they had reached the door, John held it open for Cameron like she had grown accustomed to him doing but she found it uneasy to step out into the sunshine. Something was grabbing her attention away from their priority of getting into John's prized muscle car in the parking lot. Her hesitation caused a slightly curious look to scrawl up onto the faces of the two young men standing behind her.

"Cam, everything alright?" John asked first, always picking up when something was bothering her.

Cameron seemed to come alive at the sound of his voice. Her shoulders picked themselves up slightly, as did the rest of her body. Most people never noticed that her body seemed to slump a little when she was concentrating on a particular piece of data. It was something of a 'gift' that John possessed.

"I'll tell you in the car," Cameron said softly, avoiding eye contact with both her companions and every human in the diner as she turned to speak.

Both young men seemed taken aback by her sudden shyness, normally Cameron would come right out and say something if it was troubling her. They both watched as she walked calmly over to the side of John's 1969 Challenger. She didn't wait for him to come over and open the door for her like she normally did, Cameron quickly got in and seated herself in the passenger seat.

"Whats up with her?" Kyle asked John as they stepped out onto the pavement of the parking lot.

"I have no idea, probably something I forgot to do in the apartment this morning and she's just now remembered it," John replied with a very upbeat tone.

"See you soon then, I guess."

"Yea, take care man," John said as he broke away from the young man and made his way to his vehicle.

In California it was almost always in the eighties or maybe even nineties weather wise. Normally that wasn't a problem at all, especially considering that when John had grown up there in the late eighties and early nineties and it was almost always hotter then.

Having a blacked out vehicle with both black exterior paint and a black interior with leather made for a scorching feeling when you opened the door and seated yourself behind the wheel though. John tried to get past the feeling of inhaling pure heat as air while putting on his seat belt, something which Cameron insisted on and it bugged him to no end.

"What's going on, Cam?" John asked, placing the keys in the ignition squarely and starting the car in the process.

Cameron didn't reply right away, instead she took her time to analyze every piece of the file in her cache to deliver to John an absolute answer to his question. With something of this importance she knew there could be no doubt if she were to bring it up. John was a lot like his mother, even though most of the time he vehemently denied such a thing. She knew that just one sentence from her would send him on a wild goose chase if she wasn't sure.

"Something said in the bar, it made me remember something from a long time ago,"she finally replied.

John reached over and turned on the air conditioning, knowing that he was going to be sitting there for quite awhile if she were taking this much time to say something.

"What was it," John asked questionably.

"Back in our second safe house, the one near Kacie's home," Cameron said, looking up at John in the process. "I wasn't always on the grounds at night. Instead of doing my patrols I used to..." she stopped for a moment before finishing, "go out."

John relaxed in his seat a little, the direction of the conversation taking an obvious turn from where the thought it was headed.

"I frequented the library, using and exploiting resources to track down possible leads about Skynet activity," Cameron's eyes locked with John's.

"And uh," John said, a lump catching in his throat. His weight shifted in his seat before continuing with, "what...what did you discover?"

"Further exploration one night showed that a T-888 had traveled to the wrong time temporal location. He amassed resources to secure his mission, which was the assassination of the Governor of California in 2010."

John absorbed as much as he could before replying, "And that thing is still...uh here?"

"In standby," Cameron said, giving John a half-comforting nod in the process, "He won't wake until his internal sensors deem it a mission priority in 2010."

"So he's basically a sitting duck," John said with a small lifted spirit.

"Yes, he should be dealt with immediately before we leave for Baja," replied Cameron.

John nodded to himself and to Cameron, mulling over the information in his mind before turning around in his seat and placing the stick shifter into reverse. They both sat silently as the large chassis of the car exited the parking space. It rolled to a stop silently, the cool breeze from the a/c began hitting them in the face. John placed his hand on the shifter again, but hesitated in placing it into drive.

Cameron saw his reluctance and calmly placed her hand on top of his. It seemed to have the reassuring affect that she desired, because John turned to her and slammed it into gear. The powerful machine roared to life at the response to John's foot on the gas pedal and screeched out of the parking lot out into the street.

* * *

Reviews and comments welcome.  
Thanks for reading  
To Be Continued...


	2. Chapter 2

I saw that some people didn't recognize the name Myron Stark. He was a terminator sent back to the wrong time (1920's) and hid himself in Pico Tower until he was discovered by Cameron in Season 2.

* * *

The seriousness of the situation had hit John fully in the parking lot, but it hovered in the car like a thick cloud as the car continued down the streets of LA. It had kept both of them from speaking to one another since the parking lot of the Big Boy's where his mother worked. Neither of them seemed to want to converse, and both of them seemed doubly concentrated on the task at hand, stopping Skynet yet again.

Though John knew that it wasn't truly Skynet they were stopping yet, only a lone terminator. A terminator that was in a offline state. It was almost too simple to conceive of something like that happening, but if fighting Skynet had taught John anything it was that nothing is ever as simple as it seems.

Both occupants of the car were aware that the silence that lingered over them would soon end though. John's delight of a car had drank all of the gas from the tank dry, and they needed to find a station soon. Even though the thought of talking with Cameron should have perked him up a little, it seemed strange to John that it didn't. A station soon appeared in front of the car and John obliged by turning in and parking next to a spare pump.

"I'll pay inside, do you want anything?" Cameron asked, already getting out of the car and standing up beside it.

"Uh, no. Thanks. I'm still full from the diner," John replied with a awkward smile and a pat to his stomach.

Cameron seemed to tilt her head in curiosity at him before turning and walking over to the door of the gas station.

The loneliness of the gas pump outside left John to contemplate his thoughts over what ensued in the near future for them both. Both of them wouldn't be spending time in Baja like they had planned. There wouldn't be any fall vacation there, or traveling up to New York where Cameron wanted to see a Broadway show. Hope was still possible if they completed the task at hand very soon, which depended entirely on them acquiring an ample amount of thermite.

John watched Cameron as opened the door and began walking back to their car. Taking delight in her very human action and reaction to everything. It was customary for her to have snapped into a robotic walk every now and then, even after John had blown the defense grid and traveled back in time. Now though, she partially bounced from the sidewalk down onto the pavement and continued her cool stride over to the passenger side of the car.

John had just turned the engine over and was about to pull out of the lot when the door to the station burst open and a very thin looking middle age man began running over to John's window.

"This guy on something?" John whispered to Cameron, but kept his eyes on the flailing man.

"Doubtful, he's the man operating the store," Cameron replied.

"You didn't flirt with him did you? I think you drove him mad if you did," John smirked, though Cameron saw fit to only reply with a frown.

The man came right up into John's window and thrust a fist full of change in Cameron's direction. What looked like ten bills of fives fell from his hand onto her lap.

"Sorry miss, you gave me the incorrect change. I thought you would want it back," he gave a sheepish smile before eying John momentarily.

"Thank you," Cameron said, though she didn't seem to be paying the man or John any attention at all.

"You two be careful out there. We just had a freak blackout, probably from some drunk idiot running into a power pole."

The man had turned and began walking back to his store when John called out to him from the window.

"Sir?"

"Mike, please," the man responded while turning back around to face John.

"Did the power come back on immediately or was it out for an hour or so?" John asked.

"Didn't take too long for the power company to get everything rerouted. If I had to guess, I would say it only took them fifteen minutes or so," Mike said.

"Thanks," John's eyes tore themselves away from Mike and locked on Cameron.

"We told John Henry to destroy that thing after we all went through. Is it possible he didn't?"

"It is possible, though unlikely," Cameron replied nonchalantly.

"Yea," replied John sarcastically, "because we all know how much John Henry loves sticking to orders."

His hand reached down to the gear shifter and slide it into drive gently. The car responded by moving forward and out onto the road once again. After a few moments of silence Cameron gave him directions to turn at the next right.

"Cam, you don't have to go all catatonic you know," he reached over and took hold of Cameron's left hand, "you can talk."

"I'm thinking," was all she responded with.

"About?"

"Everything, all the implications that would arise if we are successful, should we fail, why would we fail, all the variables included in that scenario, and now a new variable introduced by you about John Henry," Cameron began rattling off like she was reciting a grocery list.

"I didn't mean to bring it up to annoy you, Cam."

"I know," Cameron replied, though her attention seemed to no longer be focused on him.

John returned his attention to the road ahead and took the left turn that she had instructed him to take. Cameron's silence had left John alone to his thoughts again, and they were beginning to trouble him. His mind carried over, much like he though Cameron's did, to not only the present implications of their current mission but also to the future. He was still trying to warp his brain around having to live within the same world as a younger version of himself.

"Pull over here," Cameron said abruptly, snapping John out of his thoughts.

He had driven the car without even paying attention to the road, something he was sure that Cameron would scold him for if she picked up on it. At the moment though all of her concentration seemed to be fixed on exiting the vehicle as quickly as possible as soon as it ground to a halt. Her hand lay on the door latch and her feet were already picked up from the floorboard with anticipation.

"Cameron, he's offline. I'm sure it won't matter if you observe the rules of safety for two seconds," John teased.

"The rules of safety..."

"I know, don't apply to you," John said mockingly. Cameron nodded a stiff reply and started to slip out of the car before John grabbed her wrist, "Hey, you might be nighe invincible, but that doesn't mean you should go around doing everything we can't do."

Cameron turned to see a stern but complex expression on John's face. The external layer told her that he was growing tired of her attitude and lack of attention to everything, but there was something more there. Underneath the surface she could see that he wasn't scolding her, he was as much alone in this world and time as she was. It was something she understood, John didn't want her to be harmed or die for fear that he would be left alone.

"I know," she returned.

Both youths exited the car and began walking into the stone and brick building to their right. For having been built in a relatively early era for Los Angeles, it certainly was a tall structure. From the ground floor it seemed to reach up into the sky, something which was rare for buildings not made entirely of steel or metal.

"We need to be on the 28th floor," Cameron said, paying attention to the caution tape that covered the entrance to the elevator.

Obviously Pico Tower was still closed down or at least non-functional to an extent even in this time. When she had visited the property in 2010 there were no occupants in the building and everything was covered in dust and cobwebs. Now though it seemed as if the building was experiencing at least some level of occupancy on a daily basis.

"Looks like we are taking the stairs," John scoffed and craned his neck up space in the middle of the staircase to see the many flights of stairs spiraling upward.

"I can carry you if you want," Cameron said teasingly, even holding up her arms in a hugging manner towards him.

John responded with a roll of his eyes, but she nevertheless carried him up the stairs. It was something he never liked to admit, but all of the training his mother had given him as a kid and especially the time spent fighting Skynet had weakened his body. Not to the point of being in constant pain, but certain limbs were suffering from cartilage breakdown even in his mid-twenties.

"Okay lets see here," John said as she sat him down on the 28th landing.

"It's this way," Cameron stated, taking a step towards the doorway on the left.

John followed her into a large auditorium-type room. It was obviously a place for gatherings or speeches to be made by people who inhabited the building everyday. He immediately began looking about the room while Cameron started looking quizzically at the wall where the T-888 Myron Stark was in standby mode.

Though from her field of view the wall was opened, broken open to be precise, and the Terminator was no longer inside. Whether it awoke from standby and left, or if someone discovered its' existence, both were a huge problem to herself and John.

"John, someone got here before we did," Cameron said, nodding toward the massive hole in the brick wall.

"Shit," John muttered, "Do the phones in this building work?"

"I don't understand," Cameron responded with a tilt of the head.

"The pay-phones on the ground floor, do they work?"

"I don't know, I've never checked."

Being carried up the stairs was one thing, but John excelled in running when occasion called for it. Running downhill was an even easier task, and it took him relatively no time at all to scale all twenty-eight flights of stairs and jog over to the pay-phone on the first-floor. His hands immediately dove into his pockets for change and dialed the number of Kyle's apartment.

"Come on, come on," John kept muttering under his breath while only hearing dial tones in his ear. After what seemed like an eternity a very tense voice answered on the other end of the line.

"Yea?"

"Nest to raven, flight secure?" John spat out the code for Kyle to answer with.

"Flight is uh, John you know something I don't?" replied Kyles voice.

"Why what's happened on your end?"

"Well my apartment was broken into, everything is turned over, but nothing is missing. On the main wall of the living room is where it looks like someone deemed it a lovely spot to write a message in motor oil." John heard grunt as Kyle clamored over the upturned things in his apartment to get closer to the message on the wall, "You just don't understand. Pico Tower, gone. Are you listening?"

"That's the message? Nothing else?"

"No that's it," replied Kyle, "Any idea what it means?"

"No uh," John put his hand over the mic on the phone as Cameron came to a stop next to him, "Kyle's place is ransacked and someone left a message about this building on his wall."

"I think it's best he stay with us tonight, possibly Sarah too," Cameron replied, and began walking to the car outside of the building.

"Hello? John you there?"

"Oh right," John took his hand off the mic, having almost forgotten that he was holding the phone, "Listen, we'll be there in ten. Do you think you can convince Sarah to come along with us for the night?"

"Getting anything scheduled and following through with it with Sarah is a royal pain, but I'll do my best," Kyle replied.

"Okay, Nest out. Stay safe."

"Will do."

* * *

Thanks for reading :)  
Comments and reviews are welcome

To Be Continued...


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

**A Unexpected Companion**

* * *

"She isn't going to like this," Cameron said, looking out of John driver-side window and seeing Kyle walk towards the car with Sarah in tow.

John had to admit, his mother didn't exactly look pleased about having to tag along. Then again she wasn't the militaristic hard-as-nails person he was accustomed to seeing either, his mother still but nowhere near as rough around the edges.

"She'll be fine."

Sarah finally stopped her protests and followed Kyle willingly towards the large muscle car. John and Cameron were seated in the front seat, maybe this _trip _wouldn't be as bad as she thought.

"Hey guys, weren't expecting you here," she said.

Kyle opened the door open for her to get in then closed it behind her as she seated herself. John watched as Kyle rounded the car and climbed into the seat behind Cameron.

John was more concerned with the motorbike at the entrance to the parking structure outside of the apartments though. The rider was slim, couldn't be very old, and their face was hidden but he somehow felt the riders eyes on his vehicle.

There was no time to throw his car into reverse and pursue the bike though, not without alarming Sarah. That didn't matter anyway, the driver had already seen what they wanted to. John watched as the driver turned the bike and began exiting the parking structure as soon as Sarah and Kyle's doors closed.

John kept his eye in the rear view mirror in the area where the bike had been while Cameron watched him. She had an uncanny knack for knowing when something was off with him, and generally she would ask how she could help but with Sarah in their company that would be very difficult.

The thing that disappointed Cameron the most about their entire situation was the inclusion of Sarah. She knew how much her exclusion meant to John, but then again none of them had planned for today's events either. As much as she knew it would anger him, they would have to include his mother on everything they knew. Keeping an unwilling companion oblivious to your situation when you are possibly being hunted by cyborgs is an unwise thing, at least that is what her processor told her.

John put the car into drive and began cruising around the structure and circle to the exit.

"Kyle," they all heard Sarah whisper harshly to Kyle, "where are you taking me?"

"You'll see soon, Sarah. Right now just trust me."

The long drive to Cameron and John's safe house was a relatively quiet one. Once there, everyone tried to settle in as much as possible given the current circumstances. John was surprised when Cameron sat down at the dinner table with Sarah instead of patrolling or creeping out of windows like she normally did. Right now it seemed that she was trying to bring a little bit of comfort to his mother.

"Why did you all bring me here? I want to know what's going on, and right now!" John felt uneasy hearing the familiar harsh words without the equally harsh tone saying them.

"For your safety," John said, peeking out of a blind hanging from a window to check the perimeter of that side of the house.

"Right," they all heard Sarah chuckle to herself.

John heard a scuffling noise and turned around to his surprise seeing Cameron focused on something else entirely. Sarah had obviously tried to get up and escape only to be held down in her chair by Kyle, who looked just as displeased about the whole situation as Sarah did. Cameron though, was currently looking at both of her arms, which were under the table laying in her lap. Everyone in the room except for Sarah heard the distinctive click of a switchblade being opened.

"Cam," John said, shuffling over next to Cameron quickly and trying to take the blade out of her hands, to no avail, "you don't have to do it this way."

"It's the easiest way, John," Cameron said, still keeping her eyes on the arms below the table.

"We'll find another way."

"And convince her how," Cameron responded, quirking her head up to look at John, then over to a frightened Sarah across the table.

John knew she was right, but he absolutely hated the idea. He had to give her credit though, it was the most steadfast way of convincing his mother that machines existed.

"How long?" John whispered in her ear.

"With my plan?" Cameron asked out loud, then began doing calculations in her head, "Five weeks."

John ground his teeth together at his anger and gave Cameron a small kiss on the top of her head, "Go ahead, get it over with."

Kyle and Sarah watched John leave as Cameron's arms began moving underneath the table. Small lithe movements which seemed to be part of a dance to the both of them. Then with the final movement both hands seemed to pull apart from each other. Kyle knew what she was doing, but to Sarah it seemed like she was just flicking the knife around under the table.

"Sarah," Cameron said, setting the bloody knife on the table.

Kyle had to visibly increase his grip to hold the frightened Sarah down in her chair.

"Sarah," Cameron said again calmly, not wanting to increase the woman's anxiety of the whole situation.

"Wha..." Was the only reply she received. Sarah continued to fidget in the chair until she realized that Kyle was holding her there no matter what.

"Do you remember all the times we've spent together, shopping in malls, going to movies, gossiping?"

"Yea, sure. What the hell is this all about," Sarah was visibly trembling now.

"I need you to understand, I'm not here to hurt you," Cameron's calm voice still had no effect on Sarah at all.

John entered the room again with a towel and handed it to Cameron stiffly. Once she took it with her free hand, Cameron began wiping the blood and vessels away from the bare endoskeleton of her left forearm. There would be no need to frighten Sarah anymore then she had to.

Sarah watched as John walked into the separated kitchen angrily as Cameron set the now bloody towel on the table next to the knife. Then she watched in horror as a metallic hand and arm raised itself up and came to rest on the table.

"You're some kind of government experiment aren't you?" Sarah hissed at Cameron before snapping her head up to Kyle, "You're all secret agents or something. WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?!"

"In the near future..." John heard Cameron begin the speech he'd never hoped to hear repeated again. Listening to it once from uncle Bob was enough for one lifetime.

He walked over to a cabinet and took out a shot glass, setting it down on the counter gently. John retrieved a bottle of whiskey from the refrigerator and poured the liquor into the glass. He threw it back and winced as the amber liquid burned all the way down to his stomach. If he knew his mother, she'd probably need an entire bottle once the speech was over. John poured another glass and walked to the dinning table, handing it to Sarah.

John took notice of how shocked his mother looked. It looked like she had seen a ghost, and was on the edge of either passing out or puking. It was a mild reaction he supposed, most of the time people reacted violently when you told them the end of the world was not only a very real possibility but practically an inevitable one.

Sarah took the glass but never drank from it, it seemed that her appetite was gone, for food or liquor. She watched as Cameron stood from the table and gracefully headed towards the stairs as John and Kyle sat down at the table. She watched both of them carefully, Kyle seemed to be wanting to see if she was okay while John looked at the bloody towel and knife on the table with disgust.

"So what happens now?" Sarah said finally after gathering enough strength to say something.

"Drink that," John said, "tomorrow, hell's coming."

* * *

Thanks for reading, comments and reviews are welcome.

To Be Continued...


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

**Stocking Up**

Sarah woke the next morning even though it felt like she hadn't slept at all. Everything from the previous night was still swirling in her mind. Nuclear war, machines, and finally Cameron. _How could she be a machine, one of them?_ She seemed so human at times, but there were always times when people weren't looking at her when the girl seemed to act...mechanical.

She squinted her eyes closed while laying on the bed to try and wipe everything from her mind, but it didn't help. Last night was filled with just too much information. Kyle and John they were both in on it too, that was what threw her the most. Both of them had been friendly for the past year, but the thought of them being soldiers from the future played heavily with her brain. The ideas and thoughts came running back to her even faster when she saw the robot girl in the doorway.

"John needs us all ready to leave in ten minutes, we have food on the table if you would like some," Cameron said, flashing a sympathetic smile towards Sarah.

Sarah didn't respond verbally, right now she didn't think she could form words at all. A simple but stiff nod from her was all that Cameron needed to signify that the message was received. She turned and began walking slowly down the hallway, making sure to not make much noise for Sarah.

After taking a few more shallow breathes of air, Sarah stirred from the bed and stood straight on the floor. The world seemed a little topsy turvy to her right now, being told the end of the world is little more then a decade away can do that to a person. _How exactly am I supposed to deal with this shit? Or more importantly, why the hell am I being dragged into everything? I suppose my dating Kyle is enough to include me in the going on of everything here, but it would be just as easy to leave me as a loose end. A hard clean break of the relationship would have stung, but kept me away from all this. So why did they want to include me in this madness?_

Then it hit Sarah, "_I must be included in this 'future' of theirs. Who the hell am I if John is the leader? Obviously it someone important enough to yank out of their everyday lives..."_

The thoughts and questions continued to plague Sarah until she at last started to get ready.

"Time traveling humans, and a robot from the future. I wonder what's on today's agenda then,"Sarah muttered mockingly to herself while pulling on her shirt.

Down in the dinning room; John, Cameron, and Kyle were already eating when Sarah arrived very sleepily. Only Cameron stopped eating and acknowledged her entrance, which made Sarah curious as to why a robot could eat in the first place.

"Have 'er seat Sarah," Kyle said through a mouthful of pancakes. His words caused John to also stop eating and wait for Sarah to take her seat.

Never one to be the center of attention, Sarah hurriedly took her seat and fixed herself a plate of breakfast. All eyes soon shifted from her back to their respective plates as everyone began eating again, but in silence.

Her fork pierced the skin of the pancake but Sarah couldn't bring herself to try any of it. It looked delicious but right now there was too much on her mind, too many questions that needed answering. Moments came and passed until finally she couldn't help it any longer.

"Where are we going today?"

"An old...acquaintance of mine," John said, hesitating with his words in mid-sentence.

"And he's going to help us how?" Sarah asked, setting her fork down on her plate.

"Well if I remember correctly, he has an entire arsenal of weapons we can use. Those will come in handy if that T-triple-eight ever came online."

"So you've met people before? In this time, I mean."

John set his fork down too, knowing his mom would never allow him to eat now that she had questions to ask.

"Yes, and no. I met him when I was about five"

"So he's from the future too? Sent back to what...build up an armory?"

"Not exactly, I met him when I was a kid in this time. 1990 to be exact. He and my mom used to uh...date," John said, hoping she wouldn't push that part of the issue any further.

"So he doesn't know you yet?" Sarah asked, looking more confused then ever.

"He doesn't know me yet, but I know him...if that makes sense." John fiddled with his fork, hoping that his mother wouldn't prod too much into just 'who' she really was in the grand scheme of things.

"Well who else do you know? If you have so many friends why don't we all band together and stop this thing now?"

"Well, Sarah," John smirked for having to call his mom that, something which always drove her crazy when he was little, "for now Skynet is defeated. The only remaining piece of technology that can possibly lead to its creation is M.I.A. So until we find that triple-eight, its best not to attract too much attention."

"It would look very suspicious to authorities if a massive convoy were plowing through towns claiming to be looking for something from the future," Kyle said a little too mockingly for Sarah's taste.

John shifted his eyes over to Cameron and then Kyle and saw that they were both finished eating.

"Guess everyone's ready to go?"

Kyle looked towards Sarah, obviously concerned.

"You aren't up to eating anything babe? Don't know when we'll get another opportunity to eat."

Sarah looked down at her plate one more time before pushing it away with her right palm.

"If I eat anything right now I'll puke."

John smirked, but felt sorry for his mother. He didn't like seeing her be put through everything again, which deep down made him feel that much more determined to see this thing through. His entire purpose for coming back in time was to make sure his mother had a happy life, now she was just being dragged back into things like before.

"Well that settles it then, Cam and I will be out in the car waiting. You two meet us there in five?" John asked Kyle, still not talking directly to Sarah. He made sure his tone let her know that they would indeed be leaving and she needed to be ready.

John got up from the table and took Cameron's undamaged hand in his and lead her to the door. He had the sneaking suspicion to look over his shoulder and remind his mother of the five minute rule, but he didn't. Right now she was dealing with a lot of things, things that had driven her to the brink of psychosis before. He knew that right now above everything else, she needed her own time to process things.

Cameron stopped short of putting on her safety belt as they settled into the car, looking at the door to the safe-house while she paused. Her brain began thinking up things to say for her, something which she knew John liked. He wasn't one to sit well with uncomfortable silences for very long, even though he constantly asked for time alone to think.

"Sarah seems to be more stable now," her voice might as well have echoed in John's head.

"What do you mean? She shouldn't have to be dealing with any of this."

"She's different, not psychotic; obsessive-compulsive, irrational, or paranoid. She's more calm, and stable now then she was before."

While John heard what she was saying, he couldn't help but still be mad about having to drag his mother into this. It was his end-strategy all along; no matter if the war was won or not, she deserved a peaceful existence. Even if it was for a short while. He took Cameron's hand and watched as Sarah maneuvered herself around Kyle's arm and made her way over to the seat behind John.

_Tactical move, mom_, John thought. _Keep an eye on the enemy, and still keep your distance in case anything happens that you don't want it to do. _

It was an interesting thought that John had next, _Was she __always this way? Or did she learn everything over time?_ He had always thought that his mother learned her survival skills in various acquaintances over short periods of time, but maybe she wasn't as helpless as she always seemed.

* * *

The drive was a long one but they finally were pulling up into the front yard of one Esteban Lopez. He was a low-life that his mom had shacked up with for a short year while John was young.

"Crazy ex-green beret guy," John had described him to Uncle Bob once, and he had meant every single word of that snorted derision.

It didn't look like his choice of locales had changed much since John had been introduced to him many many years ago. Esteban was always one to be secluded, and never ever lived in a 'fancy' place. Most of the places he frequented were run-down and on the edge of being condemned, and this trailer park was no different.

To John it looked as if the only tenant in the area was Esteban, and the others had been gone since the seventies. It was a perfect hiding spot, John had to hand that to him. The location was one where he wouldn't be bothered, but still close enough to the outside world that he could still do some damage.

Though right now he should be just getting out of the military, making his paranoia that much more _charming._

John turned the car off and took a quick look around, not seeing anything but still feeling nervous about mainly everything.

"Stay here," John motioned to everyone with a hand raised. He opened the door and carefully raised his head up above the roof of the car before seeing what he was looking for.

Esteban was standing in the kitchen, a .20 gauge shotgun poking through the window and aimed directly at John. Cameron's view finally landed on Esteban as well, and she very slowly opened the door and stood in front of the blast area that would be given away by the weapon.

Kyle and Sarah watched nervously as the silence continued in the run down trailer park. Neither John, Cameron, or Esteban standing twenty feet away were moving an inch or making a sound. A cool breeze whipped through the window before Esteban finally broke the silence.

"What do you want?" came the thick Hispanic accent from inside the trailer.

"We came to end the war," John said firmly after remembering his mother repeating that to him when she and Esteban dated.

The gun still trained itself at Cameron before lowering hesitantly.

"You with the service?"

"No," John replied.

"I don't have much, what do you need?"

"C4, Anything heavy you have, and small firearms for four."

Esteban disappeared from the view of the window for a moment and left everyone wondering what he was going to be doing. Cameron shifted her gaze towards John after she asserted herself that John was out of immediate danger.

The look from her was enough to have John mumble a, "relax."

Cameron snapped her head to the door of the trailer when it flew open and out stepped Esteban with an armload of weapons.

"I have some Ak-47's, and M16, AR-15, as mid-tier. Nothing I have here is heavy," He said with the armful of weapons being laid out on the trunk of John's car.

Seeing the weapons hit his car as enough for John to wince at the new paint job that was being ruined.

"Here's the C4, and don't ask where I got these," Esteban said while pulling out four steel Mark I Desert Eagle's from his waistband.

"The eagles have enough ammo for three clips each, two clips per mid-tier rifle," Esteban continued. "Oh and one more thing, whatever you're doing; its not tied to me in anyway. And this place," he motioned back to his trailer, "gone, as soon as you and the posse pull out."

"Live long," Esteban said, taking a duffle bag from under the steps of his trailer and walking towards a truck near John's car."

"Die bloody," John finished the man's motto under his breath. He watched as the man hit a remote trigger, erupting something inside the house and causing the entire building to engulf itself in flames. There was no explosion, only a small fire that grew and grew until black smoke began billowing into the sky.

John turned to Cameron who had already began putting the guns into the trunk, handing John his eagle as she finished.

"Come on, lets get going," John said.

"After you," Cameron replied with a slight smile.

* * *

Sorry for the shortness of this chapter, there have been a lot of things I've been doing the past few weeks. The frequency and length should increase soon!


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

* * *

**Somewhere In The Desert**

**Nevada**

**August 19, 1985**

* * *

Sarah let the cool breeze of the air flow through her fingers and hair as it billowed in through the open passenger window of John's car. For now everything was semi-balanced; John and Cameron were staying behind to make sure all of the heavy duty weapons were working and cleaned while Kyle and herself were out for target practice in a remote desert location.

Kyle was driving John's car to the max that it could go, which Sarah had to admit was pretty fast. It seemed like the huge machine could plow through anything at this speed, with this momentum. The car began to slow though just as she had began to enjoy the cool breeze and Sarah shifted her gaze to Kyle as they pulled off on the side of the road.

"Welcome," Kyle said to Sarah, "to shooting one-oh-one."

He couldn't help but laugh at the trepidation on Sarah's face. They both exited the car and walked a few feet into the sand of the desert. Kyle's hand stretched out towards Sarah with a 9mm Desert Eagle and ammo clip in it, which she took cautiously.

"Now first things first," said Kyle, "I gotta go through all this safety bulls...stuff."

Sarah tried to listen and retain everything being thrown at her by Kyle but she had to admit it was a little too much. The problem may have been that Kyle insisted on explaining everything to the smallest detail. Even someone who was used to remembering things on a daily basis like a waitress would have trouble keeping up with him.

He had began explaining the proper way to load in clips into the handle of the gun. Waiting to hear the click, then pressing a thumb-tab-o-ma-bob to load the top bullet into the chamber, flip off the safety tab, then point and shoot. That would have been enough for her to remember except Kyle insisted on teaching further.

Next came the steps of actually firing the weapon, which Sarah thought would have at least been the fun part of the whole exercise. Sturdy your stance, grip the handle tightly, tighten your arms, aim down the sights of the barrel, exhale slowly, squeeze the trigger.

Sarah had been a bit unprepared at the force of the pistol in her hands. Ginger, her roommate, owned a small Saturday night special and it didn't kick anywhere near as bad as this thing. The recoil followed up her arms, made her teeth chatter slightly, and vibrated her chest.

"Now, aim at that box of cigarettes in the sand over there," Kyle said, lowering his hands from Sarah's and placing them on her hips.

Sarah did as he said and followed down the sights trying to remember everything he had told her, then pulled the trigger. The bullet sped off and destroyed the empty pack of cigarettes in one blast.

"Nice," Kyle said a little unexpectedly. _John always said she was the best fighter he ever knew, maybe it comes naturally to her..._

"Thanks," said Sarah, still recovering from the recoil of the shot. "One thing I don't get though, how come you're teaching me to shoot a gun at a machine and it's not going to kill it. If I were to shoot Cameron, she'd just have the bullets bounce off her right?"

"Well yes, and no," Kyle said, taking a large sheet of folded paper out of his jacket pocket and showing it to Sarah.

It was a blueprint drawing of what looked like an incredibly accurate humanoid machine, probably the one they were going to be hunting down.

"Now you see these," Kyle pointed to what looked like large tubular wires running through various points of the neck, arms, and legs of the machine, "these are what you need to be aiming at. This is the nervous system of the machine, if you pop one, its as good as shooting a person in the brain. Each wire carries either hydraulic oil or electrical wires to various areas of the endoskeleton. One shot is enough to let the hydraulic fluid leak or destroy the wires, either or renders that portion of the machine useless."

"What about the eyes?" Sarah said, pointing her right index finger to the eye sockets on the piece of paper.

"You would think a blind Terminator would be next to useless but you would be wrong. Shooting out the eyes will stun it for a few seconds long enough for you to run a few feet, but it won't stop it."

"Hearing?"

"Exactly, they can hear, which means they can figure out where you are. I guess it's kind of like a bat's sonar. I've seen it happen a couple of times in the field with a T-500. Believe me, they know exactly where you are, even if they can't see you."

"You guys sure do pick your enemies well don't you?" Sarah chuckled.

"We didn't pick them, they picked us," said Kyle a little flatly.

"That's not what I meant..."

Kyle brushed off Sarah's comment and went about setting up other targets for her to hit, each one at varying distances and with increased difficulty of shooting.

"Ok now pop these off, then we'll move onto moving targets," said Kyle. He took his place behind Sarah and watched as she started shooting the targets, hitting each one.

* * *

**Back at the Safe-House**

* * *

"Cam," John said calmly into the abyss of the new safe-house they were renting. He knew he didn't need to speak above an indoor voice, even if she were on the other end of the home she would hear him.

"Yes?" said Cameron as she strolled into the room.

John looked up from the table of disassembled assault rifles to see her in khaki pants with a purple tank-top, still drying her wet hair with a towel. He noticed also that her attire showed off her still gleaming metal arm, and it glistened with moisture. She took her seat next to John and continued drying her hair as he watched her.

"Here," John said, taking her metal hand away from the towel and beginning to dry it off in-between her fingers and pistons.

"There's no need," Cameron protested, "the alloy is built to withstand..."

"Better safe then sorry though, eh?" John smirked and cocked an eyebrow up to her.

"Yes," Cameron responded, "better safe then sorry."

"So," John said after a few minutes of making sure her arm was completely dry, "since when did you get off with not wanting to clean weapons."

"I like things to be clean very much," Cameron said with a tilt of her head, "but I like to be clean myself, much more."

"Ah," John chuckled and took up a barrel from one of the rifles to clean it, "and here I just thought you were trying to get out of cleaning weapons." He watched Cameron from the corner of her eye for a moment of two before adding, "God forbid you get your fingers dirty, or break a nail."

Cameron could hear the sarcasm and teasing in his vocal patterns, and she decided to play along. She continued to watch John clean the barrel for a few more seconds before making her move. It was something that she had trained herself to do around this John, don't move at a frantic pace unless you have to.

Right now though, John had settled down into his job again and was completely absorbed in it. As she stood, Cameron began processing the likeliness of him getting upset from a surprise. Most variables began presenting themselves to her immediately; it depends on what the surprise is as to what reaction it might elicit, John may react differently to the surprise depending on his mood. After a second of decision making Cameron wiped her HUD view clear, and brought her metallic hand up to tuck the long flowing hair behind her ear.

She took a quiet two steps to maneuver herself behind John and stood as still as a statue. So far her plan had worked, and John was suspecting nothing, or at least he made no signs to show it. Very quietly she leaned over his shoulder like she had seen in one of her favorite movies before. Suddenly John turned his head, which played out well for what Cameron had in mind, turning her head towards his she made sure that the kiss would still contain a little bit of surprise.

At first John seemed flustered as their lips met, even wiggling around in his seat for a split second. Cameron sensed his uneasiness and pulled away staring at his face calmly.

"You don't have to work all the time, John."

John struggled to talk, his mouth was dry, his brow was beginning to moisten, and his hands were slightly trembling. Part of him wished he was back on the battle of Avila Beach having things blow up around him.

Cameron waited for him to talk, and after a few seconds he finally muttered what sounded like a, "uh-mmph."

* * *

To Be Continued...


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

* * *

**Safe-house**

**Nevada**

**August 19, 1985**

* * *

John stood in the kitchen blinking constantly and gripping the counter-top. At this moment he wasn't quite sure what he should do. It wasn't often that he and Cameron had some alone time, and it was never the case that she came off this... It was a hard thing for him to put into words.

"John, please move," said Cameron for the fourth time, wondering why it was taking John so long to register her plea. "It won't be long before Kyle and Sarah return from their trip, and they will be hungry." He could see her logic there, especially since his mom hadn't eaten this morning.

He moved out of the way for her to reach for the pots and pans in the cupboard before she could ask him again.

"I was thinking about something a few minutes ago," said Cameron as she reached for the exact pot she desired. John could tell from her voice that she had no weird feelings about what transpired at all in the previous few minutes of the house. _Please tell me she doesn't want to discuss..._

"John?" Cameron asked, holding the empty skillet in her hand and looking at him with a rather perplexed look on her face.

He was almost to afraid to ask, "Yes?"

"Are you feeling okay, you seem distant." Cameron set the skillet down on the stove easily then reached out to him with her arm. As her skin touched his two things happened; a quick vital check revealed everything to be normal but his heart-rate and respiration were slightly elevated, and John seemed to register a shock transferring from her hand to his arm.

"I'll be fine," John fought hard to keep himself in check, "what was it you were wanting to say?"

"I was thinking, what if this is all a repetition?" Cameron's slender fingers reached into the refrigerator and began pulling ingredients out.

"A repetition?"

"Originally, your mother was meant to grow up as she pleased then she met Kyle Reese and had you instead. That shift in timelines caused you to be the leader in the war, but it also shifted the timeline of the entire world."

She looked back at John while she was slicing up bell peppers to make sure he wasn't lost in translation, "The T-800 was destroyed but also retroactively hastened the war by researchers reverse engineering its technology."

John nodded in reply as she looked back once more.

"The second time around in 1995 you destroyed the T-1000 and the T-800 destroyed himself to prevent reverse engineering after you had destroyed the Cyberdyne building, along with all the research and backup data inside. That event should have prevented the war but Skynet sent other soldiers of its own, along with Cromartie back in time to 1999 and then you sent me. Our arrival overrode the altered timeline again and set a new date for Judgment Day in 2007."

"I'm with you so far," John said, surprisingly not having to wrap his mind around the time shifts as much as he thought he would.

"We both skipped forward in time, then returned to wait out Judgment Day. It arrives and we fight Skynet until we destroy its hub base then jump back in time again to 1984." Cameron set the knife down and slid all the chopped ingredients into the skillet, which responded with a hiss filling the room of the pieces beginning to sizzle.

"You're thinking our arrival here created a new alternate timeline, which might make everything start all over again?" John crossed his arms and pondered the information for a few seconds.

"It is possible, even though Skynet was destroyed. All it would take was one machine part coming back in time before John Henry destroyed the machine, or reverse engineering the technology from the triple-eight."

John could see her logic there, and the introduction of multiple timelines was beginning to take its tole on his brain, "Only way that can happen is if we let someone get their hands on that trip-eight, there is no way in hell that John Henry left the machine alone long enough for a rogue machine to go through. The plan was always for him to destroy it immediately after we passed through, and I'm willing to bet my life he did as he was asked."

John kicked himself up from the propped position on the counter-top and walked over to Cameron. His arms wrapped around her waist carefully, trying to stay out of range of any sputtering oil from the pan.

Cameron's ears had picked up the noise but something prevented her from alerting John. Normally she would have, but right now she...didn't want the moment to end.

The doorknob turned and in walked Sarah first, followed quickly by Kyle. At first Sarah's head was facing the other direction but as soon as she saw John holding Cameron, she freaked.

John did nothing at first, then slowly removed his arms from Cameron's waist and his lips from her neck.

"Move," Sarah barked to Kyle as she began pushing for him to let her out of the door.

Kyle had no say in the matter, Sarah's ferocity payed off and wedged herself between Kyle and the wall, allowing her to slip past him and back out into the garage. He watched her for a second, making sure that she wasn't leaving the garage while venting.

"Should I go out there and calm her down?" Kyle looked apprehensively from Sarah to John.

"I'll go," replied Cameron.

Both Kyle and John looked at her incredulously.

John knew his former mother would have grabbed the nearest pair of bolt cutters and pliers and begin to dismantle Cameron bolt by bolt if she had caught them doing what she had just seen, but that wasn't his mother anymore. He hated to admit it but right now he didn't know how she was going to react in this situation.

He looked towards Cameron and gave her a halfhearted smile and a nod.

Cameron was running over scenarios in her mind on what to say to Sarah when she stopped at the door and turned back towards John, "Don't let them burn while I'm gone." She nodded towards the still cooking vegetables on the stove.

"Alright," John chuckled.

Dinner went very quietly following Cameron's conversation with Sarah. Neither John nor Kyle were cued in on anything that had happened in the garage. The small clanks of utensils against the plates followed by silence from people chewing was a very uneasy process to endure for John.

When a sudden and unexpected knock came on the front door, he jumped at the opportunity to leave the table. John forgot the protectiveness of Cameron however prevented him from reaching the door. She maneuvered her injured arm behind her back and raised the shirt to reveal her handgun.

Cameron turned the doorknob and opened the door to a teenage girl, probably just entering college by the look of her age. She was about Cameron's height with blazing red hair, freckles dotting all over her face, and with piercing blue eyes.

"Hi, there," the girl perked up as soon as she saw Cameron and John inside of the threshold.

"Uh, hello," John stammered.

"Hi, I'm Claire. I just wanted to welcome you guys to the neighborhood, it's been awhile since we had someone move in. I remember the last time was when I was about five and even then..."

The girl seemed to go on and on about her small life story, so much so that Cameron released her grip on the handgun, and John began shifting his weight from foot to foot to try and pass the time.

"Thanks," Cameron said finally when she had ended the story.

"Well if you guys need anything I live across the street, blue house, you can't miss it," the girl grinned uncontrollably.

"Thank you," Cameron repeated before beginning to close the door.

"Have a nice evening," Claire called out from the other side of the door.

Cameron watched the girl walked briskly from their doorstep and across the street but she didn't enter a home, instead she seated herself in a mid-sized sedan and drove away. She was about to relay this information to John, but he was already aware. It seemed that he was spying on the young woman from the window just a few feet away from the door.

"You think its something worth checking out?" John asked.

"Yes," Cameron replied, not even bothering to run a outcome analysis of the events laid before them.

Kyle came from the living room with Sarah on his arm, both looking very impatient, "Whats going on?"

"Someone came by and said they lived next door, yet they sped off in a sedan instead of going home," Cameron said shortly and mechanically.

"You two stay here, and prepare for something. We're gonna follow her, or try to," John shifted his eyes from Cameron to his mother and father quickly before grabbing the desert eagle from the kitchen table and heading out the door with his jacket.

"We might be gone overnight, if we aren't back by tomorrow..."

Cameron was cut off by Kyle

"No need to say it," he said sympathetically.

Cameron half-smiled in their direction then closed the door behind her and made her way to the passenger door of John's car. Kyle and Sarah watched from the kitchen window as they pulled out of the drive and sped off down the street.

"You think they're coming back?" Sarah said aloud quietly.

"If I know those two, hell wouldn't keep them from accomplishing their mission."

* * *

Starting with this chapter the character, Denise, name was changed to Claire. It was a mistake made on my part from misinterpreting part of the history of the tv series.

Sorry for any confusion

To Be Continued...


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

* * *

**John's Car**

**Nevada**

**August 19, 1985 10:09 PM**

* * *

"Do you think she's seen us yet?" John asked hesitantly.

Cameron looked out at the road ahead of them, filled to the brim with cars. Though the various trajectories did complicate her systems for a bit, she did confirm that the young woman's driving habits were still going as smoothly as ever.

"Unlikely, just stay at least ten car-lengths back and we should be good."

John nodded and gripped the wheel a little tighter, anxious to see what the girl had been doing around their home. He kept trying to think of ways to calm himself, having been away from combat and sticky situations for awhile had left him grasping for an adrenaline rush. Now that he had such a rush, it was starting to take its toll on the rush hour traffic, he felt like he needed to steamroll over every car between them but he knew better.

"I never got a chance to ask," John said while turning his head to face Cameron now that the road was officially gridlocked, "how did things go with mom?"

"Sarah is a very understanding person when she wants to be," replied Cameron, her eyes still firmly laid on the road ahead of them.

All of that made John feel like he was going insane. Here they were on a highway following a complete stranger, _and_ she says his mother is 'very understanding'. Either Cameron was equipped with some mental brainwashing ability that he was currently unaware that she possessed, or he tortured her into submission. Right now that was the only path that made sense.

It had been nearly thirty minutes since they had stopped there outside the JCPenny department store to shadow the girl. John and Cameron had spent that time in near silence which didn't seem to both her, but it was driving John to places he didn't want to be.

_Fill your head with things to do,_ John kept telling himself. An old trick that his mom and himself had perfected throughout their years of being on the run; when bored, fill your head with things to do.

His brain actually started to search for something to think about, but it always landed back on the thing he had been trying to get away from in the first place; Skynet. _Guess there isn't any stopping it then,_ John loathed as he shifted his weight in the seat and began to ponder everything all over again. John's thumbs ran along the steering wheel, absentmindedly counting the notches in it while he began to think about the war and its repercussions.

They'd fought it at nearly every stage in his lifetime; youth, teen years, adulthood, and now here he was fighting the machines before he was even born. _Technically I have been born already,_ John told himself sarcastically as another mindless pedestrian came strolling out of the store doors.

That was one thing that stayed on John's mind the most, what would happen now that they had began the war in this timeline? What would happen to his mother and father, as well as himself?

He always tried to pace himself when thinking about those things. Whenever he thought too much about a particular thing he would get angry and lash out, or come up with a plan to make that one thing never happen. In war that could be the game changing move, or it could mean the death of the whole human race. Too much attention and focus on one thing was bad and John knew that.

The question that bugged his mind now though was, what is going to happen to mom now. Normally he was on the fritz with his mom, but this woman was different. She wasn't the battle-hardened psychotic person that he was used to. No, this person had been uprooted quite violently and thrown into a war.

_Great going there by the way, _John sarcastically told himself, _the whole point of coming back here was so she wouldn't have to deal with all this shit._ John rolled his eyes at the thought and shifted his right hand from the steering wheel to his thigh, and began tapping out the beat to one of his favorite songs...A song that didn't even exist yet.

_Sheesh, here we go again. Can't you for once think of anything except time travel?_

No, that was probably a null possibility and John knew that. Not thinking about all this lead to him getting soft, him getting soft meant that eventually Skynet would win, if Skynet wins the human race is finished. But it was there in the car that a question began to plague John's mind that hadn't made itself known for quite some time.

_What makes me so certain that I am the right person for the job. The whole logic behind me being the great military douchebag is the training I received as a kid helped me learn strategies later one and eventually win against the machines. If training is all it takes, can't someone else carry the burden? Wouldn't someone else be able to spend the majority of their life running around from hole to hole trying to keep the species alive? _

John remembered asking his mother the same question once before she blew up the computer factory that lead to her incarceration at Pescadero. Her reaction was plain and simple, "That person wouldn't be John Connor."

_But what makes me so god-damn important? Is their some hidden strategical ability waiting to be unlock or some-shit like that? Because I've been in the war and I basically accomplished nothing the entire time. Granted I wasn't the General through most of it, but still... After all that build up of being the messiah I was expecting something more..._

"John," Cameron repeated for the third time.

"Yea?" John said through squinted eyes.

"You sounded as if you were about to fall asleep."

"No," John replied, "because that is what I do every night. Rock myself to sleep with tales of time travel, death, and machine warfare."

"Time travel ruins your life," Cameron said a little to bluntly, "but it strengthens you too."

John picked his head up from the head-rest and looked at her, "How?"

"What do you think would happen if nothing ever happened?" was her simple reply.

_Great,_ John thought, _Answer a question with a question. Great psychology there Cameron. __What do you think would happen if nothing ever happened?__ As if I would know that. Everything in my life is predetermined because of Skynet. I never got to do anything I wanted, except for running away from foster homes. Never got to do what I wanted to...God-damn it Cam..._

John tried to hide the discomfort of those thoughts from his face, but it showed in his body movement. That was all Cameron needed to know to let her acknowledge that the psychology behind her question had worked. She knew John was the type of person that didn't like to be told things, after all he spent most of his youth being told what to do and who to be. No, John was the type of person to figure things out for himself and the sooner he did that the better off things would be.

Cameron returned her attention to the doors of the JCPenny store where the young woman had entered and found her walking out with a rather large amount of bags at her side. _She must be very unwise to do such a thing, unless she didn't know..._

_ "_John we need to pick her up and leave now!" Cameron said firmly, never taking her eyes off of the young woman.

John didn't need to be told twice, he'd spent enough time with Cameron to know that if she told him to do something it wasn't to be taken lightly. He didn't like following people's orders as much as anyone else did, but Cameron never told him to do anything unless it was vital to his and everyone's survival.

He waited in his seat until the young woman passed them on the sidewalk to make his move. She hardly had time to react at all before John opened the door and grabbed her (and her bags to his surprise) and threw her into the open backseat where Cameron was now waiting. As soon as he returned to the drivers seat he heard Cameron tell him to drive, and he responded by slamming his foot on the pedal and weaving through traffic.

Cameron took her eyes off John and rested them fully on the terrified woman in front of her now. She seemed to be clawing at the door handle to get out, but one swift movement by Cameron's metallic hand let her know that she wouldn't be leaving at all.

"What is your name?" she spoke in a hard tone, asserting her dominance on the girl.

"C...Claire!" the girl's hands began shaking as her eyes landed on the metal arm protruding through Cameron's jacket. Her eyes grew twice as large as they had been and she let out a sharp shrill in the air.

John looked up through the rear-view mirror, "What are you doing to her?"

"Nothing," Cameron replied. She turned back towards the girl and asked her next question, "Who and where is that man that gave you the money?"

The girl looked dumbstruck at her question, and fumbled with her words.

Cameron didn't have time for games or absentmindedness, she reached down into one of the bags and pulled out an expensive looking garment for the time period.

"This, judging by these you aren't the type of person who can normally afford such luxury," Cameron tightened her grip on the girls polyester t-shirt and it ripped a little, confirming her premise that the girl was paid off.

"Alright, alright," Claire said a little more in control of herself now, "some weird guy came up to me outside of the galleria. Offered me a thousand bucks to go to your house and just introduce myself."

"Why did he pick you, what were you doing when he asked, what did he look like?"

The flurry of questions from Cameron left Claire once again dumbfounded.

"I...I dunno. I was just standing there talking about new people in the neighborhood when he heard what I was talking about and offered me the cash. That's it I swear!"

"What did you tell him about us?"

"I..." the girl fumbled again and shifted her eyes away from Cameron for the first time since they started talking. Realizing the movement as a subtle way for her to think up a lie, she tightened her grip on Claire's shirt again. "Alright, alright! Chill out! I took a photo of you guys and handed it to him. He only wanted me to go to your house after he saw it."

Hearing those words sent a shockwave through John, and he responded by putting the pedal to the floor in hopes of getting back home. He knew why Cameron was in such a hurry in the first place now. It was the mouse trap all over again. His mom had told him about Cromartie's plan with Charlie's wife. It was all smoke and mirrors to get everyone away from his target.

The stupid machine would undoubtedly know that someone would follow the girl in the backseat, either way the people left at the house would be on his hit list. All the terminator had to do was choose whether he wanted to kill the mother, father, or leader of the future. John pushed his thoughts aside as he started weaving through more and more rush hour traffic while Cameron started questioning her suspect in the back again.

"Where do you live?"

"Across from you guys, like I said."

"If you lie I'll know," Cameron said, leaning so close to Claire that their noses touched.

"I uh...I...my name's Claire!" the girl spat out and raised her free arm up to shield her face from Cameron. But something happened then that she didn't expect. It seemed like Cameron completely froze. The tight grip still remained on her shirt sleeve but she wasn't moving at all.

"HELP!" the girl shrilled again, trying to get John's attention.

"HEL..." the girl tried to scream a second time only to find Cameron's hand over her mouth.

"Is your last name Young?" Cameron said, her voice barely above a whisper so that only Claire could hear her.

The girl nodded, tears beginning to stream down her cheeks.

"Are you 14?"

The girl nodded again.

Cameron sat back against the other side of the car stunned. The terminator chose not only a random girl off the streets but he chose Claire Young, mother of Allison Young. What were the odds?

"Please," Claire said, "just..just let me go home. I just wanna go home!"

John watched carefully in the mirror as Cameron let the girl go and moved to the opposite side of the cars back-seat. He knew something was up but the question was, what had happened? Right now he didn't give his brain time enough to think, they were rounding the corner to their street when something caught his eye that he had hoped not to see.

Smoke and ash were covering the area of the sky as it began to rise more and more. Neighbors that were home were standing outside staring at the fire coming from their house in shock. It was a quiet neighborhood, things obviously didn't happen around here that often. Cameron and Claire were staring at the blaze to, which had blown out the front windows of the home and were now emitting monstrously sized arms of flames.

Before John could even react as the car came to a stop and he switched off the ignition, Cameron leaped from the back-seat and began sprinting at an almost inhuman pace towards the front door.

Claire, by now, knew her chance to escape had come and moved her hand to access the door handle but John moved even faster. Before Claire had time to react to anything she was staring down the barrel of John's handgun. His hands weren't trembling at all, there was no hesitation in his facial movements. He was aiming the gun at her with intent to kill if he needed to, that much she understood crystal clear.

Even John though was surprised at the passenger back door re-opening and Sarah along with Kyle were thrown into the seat. Sarah looked absolutely terrified and kept clutching Kyle's stomach. Cameron got into the front passenger's seat beside John and tapped the dash as if to snap him from a daydream.

John stopped looking at the torn image of Cameron now and rested his eyes on the road. People from the other houses were beginning to cautiously encroach on the car, unsure if they were friend or foe. He needed to get everyone out of there fast, and there was only one way to do that. He threw the car into gear right after cranking it up and blew the horn.

People rushed out of the way as the muscle car peeled away from the scene of a burning home. They watched in continued shock and horror as the fire finally claimed its victim completely and the home caved in on itself.

Claire began screaming almost as soon as they had took off.

"Please, just let me go."

John's eyes flew to her in the mirror, but ultimately settled on his mother and father in the back. _Mom's still clutching his stomach. He must have gotten hurt badly in there. How badly, though?_

Cameron turned calmly to silence Claire with one of her death-stares. Truthfully, John knew it would give the girl nightmares for months to come. He had only seen a fraction of the damage the fire had done to her but John honestly didn't want to see anymore then he already had. Half of her hair was singed to a crisp, along with black smut being smeared across here brow and neck. Something, though John didn't know what, had hit her hard enough to tear flesh from her left cheek down to her jaw offering a glimpse into the mechanical workings and teeth inside. Smoke and foul smells were coming from her, the odors of burnt flesh.

"How's he doing," John asked Sarah out loud to break Claire's silence.

"Uh, bad," Sarah responded with fright in her voice.

Cameron turned from looking at Claire to studying Kyle's vitals next to Sarah. She took note of everything she could before turning to John and leaning into his ear so that nobody would hear her.

"There was a partial roof collapse. He had already freed himself when I entered. The color of his blood is black. We need to drop him off."

Cameron didn't need to say anymore then that to make John alter his course from desert to local hospital. Black blood was bad he knew that from spending enough time around his mother in hectic situations after many run-ins where she was injured to the brink of death. It meant either one to two things; a ruptured spleen or liver. Both wounds were fatal unless given immediate medical treatment, and right now they didn't have that available in time to save him. If it was his spleen he could hold out a little bit, but a liver wound meant he'd be dead in twenty minutes at best.

John continued to hear Sarah's mumbles to Kyle telling him to hold on while they pulled up to the hospital. Doors flew open as the vehicle rolled to a stop just outside of the emergency entrance. Only Cameron and Claire remained in the car. As soon as Kyle exited the car and entered the double glass doors of the hospital nurses were swarming from behind their desks to his side.

Sarah watched as they took him and yelled for stretchers at least ten times. Everyone in the waiting room was captivated by their entrance into the building, most were looking and staring at the young man bleeding blood profusely from his abdomen. Then, as Kyle was laid on a stretcher and wheeled towards a room down the hall Sarah felt John's hand pulling her back towards the doors. She didn't want to leave, Kyle was her rock right now and honestly she didn't think anything was going to be alright unless he was standing next to her.

John half ran with her out of the hospital and back into the car. Wards and nurses from the hospital were beginning to run after them to ask questions and get information but they couldn't risk that. The world wasn't connected via computers yet, but they still couldn't risk a rogue terminator getting information about all of them concentrated in one location.

Sarah was watching through the back windshield with teary eyes as they peeled away from the building with nurses and wards trailing them. Claire was dumbfounded and still in shock from Cameron's death-stare. Cameron turned to John and rested her undamaged hand on his thigh, offering a comfort that right now she knew he needed.

* * *

To Be Continued...

Sorry for the one month delay. Had a lot of stuff going on as well as hitting some writers block in the middle of this.

Stay tuned!


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

* * *

**Kyle Reese's Hospital Room D317**

**Nevada**

**August 21, 1985 9:00 PM**

* * *

Kyle opened his eyes with reluctance and saw a bleak interior of a room.

The walls were as bare as they could be, beeps and mechanical noises were going off, and the air had a sterile aroma to it. _Must be a hospital_, he told himself groggily between labored breaths. _Never been in one before really, unless you count that time I broke my arm playing softball with Derek._

_Come on, _Kyle told himself as his eyes involuntarily closed again, _stay awake. Gotta find the exits._

Kyle tried to stir himself awake, hoping a little movement would keep himself from falling unconscious again. His body was sore, but his stomach ached with more pain then he was accustomed to dealing with. The only thing that he had to compare it to was getting knocked back by a metal before it went in for the death blow.

_Weird, thought hospitals gave you drugs to hide the pain_, Kyle joked to himself as he turned his head over and opened his eyes again. This time his head was facing a window, which gave him a nice view of the outside world, and the nurse which was sitting at his bedside. He tried to hide his arousal and close his eyes again but it was too late, she had noticed him stirring in bed.

She reacted to his waking by putting down her tabloid magazine and getting up to check the machine equipment next to his bed. Her nametag read, Jordan, an average height lady in her early thirties, flaming red hair, with an attractive figure even if it was disguised by hospital garb. Kyle continued watching her silently as she made small adjustments by hitting small buttons on one of the machines, changing his medication dosage.

"Care to give us your name?" she said softly with a smile, "or anything about yourself?"

Kyle knew the girl wasn't an ally of Skynet, or a cop trying to get information, but the procedures drilled into his head from time spent in the resistance told him to give little to no actual information. The throbbing in his body and stomach began to fade away which was a sure sign of the increased medicine kicking in. _Good,_ Kyle thought, _gives me an excuse to not answer her questions._

His eyes grew heavier as the morphine began to really set in and Kyle began to fade out of consciousness. Just as he was completely going under he was able to discern a few words from Jordan that made him want to bolt up from the bed and run; "What's Skynet?"

* * *

The nurse turned to leave the room and made her way into the hall. Her usually calm and matured face seemed concerned and even flustered at the young boy in the room. She couldn't recall ever having a patient like him, yet there was nothing about him that stood out. Stacy knew that if she were to see him in the middle of a crowded street she would think nothing of him and continue on her way.

But there was still something about him...

John and Sarah watched from afar down the hall, sitting in the waiting room chairs. Sarah was looking concerned and leaning forward in her seat to catch any news that the young nurse would reveal. John remained calm, but had a strained look on his face as the nurse relayed the information to the nurses' station that the boy was stable.

He relaxed in his chair slightly until the police officer came into view on the other end of the hall. Without even telling himself to, he immediately picked out the exits of the room again just in case he needed to bolt for them with Sarah.

It was standard police protocol to inquire as to just how Kyle had been pulled from a fire and dropped off at a hospital without any information what-so-ever. John knew they would be inquiring about Kyle until they were allowed to question him themselves. It was a bad risk to take Kyle here, but he would have surely died otherwise.

_Why do I always get left with making decisions like that,_ deep down he knew that it came with the territory but he still never grew accustomed to making them. He half smirked to himself when he had received Cameron's reply on the situation, "That's what makes you John Connor."

The cop had now finished his questioning and was turning to walk towards the waiting room. For a brief moment the cop was held up because of his flirtatious attitude with the nurse that had exited Kyle's room, giving them both a chance to leave without being noticed.

"Come on," John said, patting Sarah on the hand. "We need to go."

* * *

**3****rd**** Precinct. Detective Tallahassee's Desk**

**Nevada**

**9:04 PM**

* * *

Greg flipped though the reports on his desk one more time, trying to decifer any more information that he had somehow missed. _Everything is in place, yet so whacked, _he thought to himself as his partner, Officer O'Malley, sat down at his respective desk.

He stopped ciphering through the papers and laid them down to rest. Right now he needed a moment to gather his thoughts on this shit-storm of a case. It wasn't often that he saw things on the job that threw him for a loop, but this one in particular was the first in a long time that had his head spinning in circles.

_ A kid is pulled from a house, which is on fire, and we don't __even know how it started in the first place. Apparently there was a girl inside the house with him when he was pulled out. Neighbors reported signs of wounds on all three of them, especially the rescuer, yet only the boy was dropped off at the hospital. _

_ Then of all things the rescuer decides to turn one-eighty and shove them into a car, fleeing the scene in the process. The Youngs' who lived across the street reported seeing their young teenage daughter in the backseat of the car when it fled. _His brow furrowed again as he went over the information again._ We don't have anything, and won't have anything until that kid wakes up and gives a statement._

"Eh? Greg?"

The sound of his colleagues voice drew him from his thoughts again and forced Greg to acknowledge him, "Yea?"

"Nurse gave an update to the kid. Say's he woke up but went unconscious just after opening his eyes." O'Malley took a bite of his sandwich after giving his superior the news.

Greg looked over at Justin O'Malley with a raised eyebrow and minor annoyance. Ever since his young colleague had joined the force he'd taken to gorging his mouth at the most inappropriate of times. The guy was only in his mid thirties and was in healthy shape, _must have the metabolism of a thoroughbred horse._

"And?" Greg waved his hand in the air, waiting for a continuation to the statement.

Justin looked up with a full mouth, taken by surprise that Greg had interrupted him. "Whaphf?"

"Did the kid say anything while he was awake?"

Justin put down his sandwich and took out his notepad with the nurses' statement on it. _Why can't he just read the notes himself, its like I gotta read everything to him. _He took one last chew and painfully swallowed the mass of sandwich in his mouth.

"Err...Did he awake...responded with yes...I asked if anything was said while conscious...response of no, but the boy had been talking in his sleep...I asked if he said anything about the fire...response was no, but repeated the words; metal, Skynet, and Sarah while asleep."

Justin flipped the notebook closed and looked over at Greg for a nod of approval to begin eating again only to see him lost in thought again. The rookie cop didn't understand his partners fascination with this case. Sure, things were completely weird and they had next to nothing as far as a lead was concerned; things would always work themselves out in the end though, of that Justin was fully aware. The forces of good and evil are always butting heads, that is what necessitated his profession in the first place.

The older man continued to frown as he poured over the information in the reports on his desk again. No matter how much he looked, nothing was coming up at all. Nothing was showing itself, or leaping out at him like it did in other cases. In all of his years on the force he'd never seen such a weird case of circumstances again. _A fire, two are rescued, then they kidnap one of their neighbors teenage daughters._ _There are only two ways I __see things unfolding; either the kidnapped girl was responsible for the fire and they kidnapped her for torture, or something happened that she saw something that she wasn't supposed to. _

"Alright," Greg said, standing up and grabbing his coat that had been draped across his chair, "lets go numskull."

Justin looked up from his half-destroyed sandwich, both cheeks bulging with food.

"Whe-ph we goings?"

"I need coffee, then I'm going to interview that nurse. Hopefully the boys woken up by now long enough that _we_ can talk to him."

Outside the station and parked across the street were John and Sarah again. Both of them holding items for reading but neither had their attention centered on the objects in their hands. They were both paying absolute attention to the police officer which had came from the hospital, who was now leaving with an older looking officer.

_Must be the superior,_ John thought as the younger cop finished eating the crumbs of his sandwich and began following the older cop towards the lot of parked police cruisers. _Sure didn't stick around long enough for relaying of information._

_ I don't like this, we have to get Kyle out of there; and do so quickly and quietly._

* * *

**Kahlua Motel**

**Nevada**

**11:24PM**

* * *

"Keep still," John said soothingly as he raised his arm again.

The water slowly trickled down from Cameron's shoulder and down her back until John moved his arm down and wiped it away. He took great care to make sure the liquid never touched the bandages that covered most parts of her back and torso now. Normally when he had seen her 'bathe' it was in the nuclear power plant in the old radiation scrub down chambers. He was no stranger to seeing her in this way, but it was the first time he'd ever seen her unable to help herself which was why he had offered assistance.

Cameron looked over her shoulder and into John's eyes noting that they weren't lingering on her frame at all. They seemed to move from area to area of her back, discerning if there was anymore soot and ash staining her skin. Occasionally his eyes would shift to an area of the shower wall, only to resume their scrutiny a moment later.

"John, you don't have to..."

"It's the least I can do," he replied, "besides, you don't want these getting too wet do you?"

Cameron remained silent and unmoving as he finished up wiping the dirt and soot off of her bare skin. She didn't know what to say at the moment, and with her knowledge it was best to remain silent with John if she wasn't sure of what to do or say. A smile crept up on her lips as she remembered that. It was small things like of that nature which gave her glimpses of joy. Knowing and sharing something with John that few or nobody else knew about.

"Are you sure I got these right? I mean, I did get the right stuff didn't I?" John placed the wet cloth down in the sink and patted one of her bandages.

Cameron nodded softly in reply. It was true that some of the materials weren't of outstanding quality, but the stolen chemicals and medicine would help speed the re-growth of her synthetic skin. Instead of waiting an estimated five months to be repaired she would only need to wait for six weeks. The only downside was the limited mobility, in an ideal world she wouldn't even be moving at all. _Bed-ridden, _was the term that came to her mind.

"Yes," she finally responded after leaving him waiting for a reply, "everything is not available in this time but the mixture should help to speed the healing process." She moved her hand up and placed it tenderly on John's resting hand.

"Thought the house had taken you all today you know?" John said, running his thumb over the silky skin of her hand. Watching it move back and forth as if he was having an out-of-body experience, not in control of himself anymore.

"It would take a lot more then just a house to stop me," Cameron replied teasingly. She turned to face him now and stepped out of the shower, their faces were now mere inches apart.

John half-smiled and leaned forward, hugging her tightly. He stayed that way for what seemed like long and unending minutes until he pulled away. She was will looking at him warmly as he leaned over and grabbed a dry towel to drape around her shoulders.

Cameron remained still, silently cursing the fact that she knew she had to remain still as much as possible for the time being. She had to will herself from moving, from doing what she desired to do. It wold take a few weeks before she was able to move freely again, until then she knew she would be safe in his hands.

"Now," John said with hesitation, "what do you want to do with this?" He raised his hand to one of the small patches of hair she had left. Most of it had been singed and burned away to the point of her scalp, leaving most of the skin on her head exposed.

"Compensation seems inevitable, but if you give me a mohawk expect repercussions when I'm able to catch you." Her eyes sunk at the thought of loosing the remainder of her hair but like she had said, it was inevitable. Dealing with a shaved head was only one small discomfort she would have to endure for the next few weeks.

"Deal," John snickered while picking up the scissors.

* * *

Cameron stood in front of the mirror, surveying the work John had done to her scalp as he prepared dinner in the kitchen. Luckily they had managed to find an available room with a kitchen, but it also meant that Sarah and the Young girl would be staying in the same room as them. Sarah could be trusted to stay near, after the talk she and Cameron had shared in the garage of their old safe-house. The Young girl, could not be trusted to stay put and not alert authorities to their location. It was a shame, John had a particular disliking for making people do what they didn't want to do.

She ran her hand over her now bare scalp, noting the approximate time that it would take for her hair to be at suitable length again. It wasn't that she disliked sharing a room with the girls but it was the fact that she was used to having alone time with John. Time to talk with him, and further learn things from and about him that she would truly miss. Cameron found herself fascinated by even the smallest story or thing he described; John scrapping his knees after learning to ride a bike the first time remained one of her favorites.

_Selfishness, _she noted, _its a human emotion. According to John though, I am human. _

Cameron raised her hand to the large patch of gauze covering the hole on the side of her jaw. _It doesn't help to be constantly reminded that I am not._

Noises from the kitchen let her know that dinner was probably ready, but she didn't move. She remained transfixed by herself in front of the mirror. Ideas were running through her head about John now; his fight with Skynet heating up again, the problem of carrying around two untrained girls, and the hindrance of herself as well. All of them were plaguing her mind. John's voice caught her by surprise when his head popped in to check on her.

"Hey, dinners ready."

"I'll be right out," she replied but let her voice trail off into a whisper by the end of the sentence.

"You ok?" John asked looking concerned, coming into the room and shutting the door behind him.

"I...don't know."

John came and placed his hands on her shoulder for a moment before they were brushed off by Cameron turning around. He noticed everything about her as time began to slow. The bandages seemed to go away, leaving him with the image of only Cameron standing there, not a hurt friend. The bandages weren't bothering him at all before, he just didn't even see them now.

"Is everything okay in there?" Cameron nodded towards the door, and the waiting Sarah and CLaire outside.

"Uh, I think." John said unsure of what Cameron was doing, "I can check..."

Before he had a chance to react, John found his hand being prevented from opening the door. It was now in the grasp of Cameron's metallic fingers, gently but firmly keeping them held at bay. She pushed herself up onto the balls of her feet until their lips met. Both of them felt the length of time passing by as if the ages of empires were only a second.

He could feel himself ease into her after a moment, and let his back rest against the wall. John was quite surprised when she leaned in again, breaking their connection to allow him time for a quick breath. It was only briefly, however, then she was back onto him again, leaning into his body as it pressed up against the wall.

He could feel her trying to exert herself more then she needed to, and wrung his hand from her grasp. She looked up at his eyes, almost as if in a pouting manner until he put both his arms around her. Letting his hands slide down her back, gently up and down. The sensations of his rough fingers against her skin was enough for her to exist in bliss until the end of her days as far as she was concerned.

Cameron broke the contact of their lips again and rested her head gently on his shoulder. They remained there for a few more minutes, letting each support the other in their embrace. She traced the lines of his muscles under his shirt while listening to him breath in and out.

"I don't know how this is supposed to work you know?" John said, breaking the long silence.

"Maybe its just supposed to work itself out," she replied, remembering a distant conversation with him fondly. It made her smile as she looked back up at him.

"What does that mean?" said John, a wry smile on his lips.

"It means let it be," Cameron replied, and stepped away from him while reaching for the doorknob.

John stopped her with a calm hand resting on her shoulder, "I mean...I don't know what to do. I don't know what I'd do if you weren't here. You or anybody. It's hard to imagine life without you guys."

Cameron pursed her lips partially before responding, "We aren't going anywhere, John." She waited for a moment to allow him time to hear that before she added, "And I'll be here for when you're ready."

John watched as she walked out of the door and into the motel room. Both of the girls were eating on the second bed and weren't paying attention to Cameron at all. John leaned against the doorway and watched Cameron slip underneath the covers of the bed closest to the bathroom door.

She settled into the bed underneath the covers before holding out the damp towel towards him. John half-smirked as he took a step out of the bathroom doorway and took the towel. _She'll be out like a light in a few minutes_, John thought to himself. He threw the towel into the hamper and walked back into the room, heading for the kitchen.

John took his tv-dinner out of the microwave and turned towards the beds again to see Sarah and the Young girl watching the news. He assumed that Sarah was listening for any word on Kyle and Claire probably for any word on herself in the news. His eyes came to rest though on the soft silhouette of Cameron and her form which was hidden by the layered sheets of the bed.

_Out like a light, _he told himself again while taking a bite of dinner.

* * *

To Be Continued...

Sorry for the long gap in chapters. The holiday season was quite busy, and I wasn't left with much time to write. More to come though!


	9. Chapter 9

There is a lot of dialog in the chapter which is what makes it seem longer then it actually is. I'm usually not the best with dialog, its the reason it takes me so long to publish a chapter now. There is a bit of french in the chapter. The translation of it is; such is life.

I hope you all enjoy.

* * *

**Chapter 9**

* * *

**Connor Hotel Room**

**Nevada**

**August 23, 1985 1:03 AM**

* * *

John was watching Cameron from across the room, laying there in the bed alone and unmoving. If he wasn't aware that she should be restricting her movement John would have been worried. She was never this still during the night, though he supposed that she knew he was aware of that. John didn't fool himself into thinking he could keep anything hidden from her, after all he knew almost everything there was to know about the still girl in the bed. Even if he didn't know anything John knew she would tell him about if he asked.

A car drove by the building and continued down the street. The headlights cast small slits of white beams in through the windows. The curtains were drawn as much as possible but the streams of light still trailed along the walls. They bathed whatever they touched in brightness as they slid along the walls and over John as he watched the person drive by. Until at last the light left the room and everything was cast back into the darkness.

Sarah and Claire stirred slightly, which didn't surprise John much. He knew that his mother had always been a light sleeper. It made sense that she still was before the craziness of Skynet entered her life.

John remained propped against the kitchen-counter watching everyone sleep. His arms were folded against his chest, trying to keep from falling into the inevitable pattern of finding things to do before passing out. It wasn't that he had problems forcing his body to stay awake, that was no problem. John knew his true dilemma lay with finding things to keep his mind occupied. There were only so many things to do that required no noise on his end; and counting to one-hundred was getting old really fast.

He could really go for a shower right now, but again that would cause noise. Not to mention it would require him to leave the room, leaving everyone else vulnerable while he enjoyed himself. _Everything and everyone above yourself,_ John was reminded of a long lost book he had read while sneaking into the library during school one day.

Smirking to himself, John pushed himself up off of the counter; he remembered the idea of him sneaking into a library of all places. It seemed absurd, even to himself, but while the elementary and middle school libraries had a rather bland selection of books; John found the high school selections to be much more interesting. He didn't dwell in too many areas, mainly because he was skipping class to go in there, but also because he had always been looking for a specific set of books . Nearly all of them were located in the biographies section; he had read every single book on military leaders and strategy he could get his hands on.

John walked over to the bed where Cameron was resting and lay down next to her. He knew it would take something threatening to wake her up, so he didn't worry about disturbing her too much. He finally put all of his weight on the mattress and allowed his body to relax for one moment.

"Can't sleep?" Cameron's voice came from his side. Her face and body gave the tell-tale signs that she was sleeping, but apparently she hadn't been.

"No," he whispered, turning over onto his side to face her.

She remained motionless, and facing the ceiling. Calm and serene. John continued watching her, both of them silently breathing in an out for minutes on end. He could already tell that after two days she was healing quite well.

_Make another run for supplies in the morning,_ he made a mental note. She had been going through them like crazy, perhaps even more then she had anticipated. He didn't know if she had the abilities to funnel her functions to speed the healing process but it seemed plausible. Restricting movement and other simple processes would be easy for her to do if she could indeed do them. _Heal yourself just by telling yourself to heal faster_, he thought.

"John?" Cameron spoke softly, only loud enough for him to hear.

"Yea?"

"Do you think it will ever be over?" she finally turned towards him. Cameron tried to give him a half smile of comfort but it wasn't something she could do. Normally she found herself having no trouble hiding her emotions to people, it was very simple most of the time. Right now though, she needed honesty from John and she in turn wanted to be honest with him.

John paused for a moment; It was a question that he had been asking himself ever since 1999 when Cameron had shown up. Wasn't it ever enough? What did he have to do? What kind of sacrifices would finally be made to where Skynet was no longer a threat to the Earth?

"Honestly, it should have been over a long time ago," John finally responded. Cameron's brow cinched with interest meddled with curiosity, waiting for an elaboration on his part. "I mean how many times can you defeat something before its gone?"

"It depends on the will of the accused," Cameron said, finishing John's train of thought. "The stronger the individual or being, the harder it is to make them go away."

John chuckled, catching her off-guard, "You think it would have learned about six months into the war if that was the case." He let his eyes wander to the ceiling, counting the cracks in the tiles there for a moment, "Maybe then it would have stopped."

He felt Cameron's hand slip into his grasp, pulling his attention back down to her. She was propped up on her elbow facing him, her hair draped down on to the mattress below. Her eyes were studying his face intently, her free left hand was tracing the scar that ran from his cheek to his forehead.

"You mean," Cameron paused for a moment to re-evaluate his previous statement, "peace?"

"Don't tell me you haven't thought about it?" John said, tightening his grasp on her hand a small bit. "You are an AI, capable of thought and self-awareness. So is Skynet. What if Skynet were shown what we truly were? What if we could convince it to live alongside us, not slaughter us by the thousands."

"I don't think it would..."

John cut her off, still lost in his train of thought, "I mean, think of Skynet itself for a moment. From what we know, it was created as an AI. That AI then grew until it became self-aware." John turned back towards Cameron, "It took it what, four days? Four days to consider us a danger to its' existence, then started a genocide. That is the most basic human instinct if I've ever seen one."

"Self-preservation," Cameron finished John's train of thought, "Skynet reacted out of fear."

"Fear is one of the basic emotions that every living creature feels. Animals, humans, even machines apparently."

"We do," Cameron said, not as a question or statement. She simply came to the understanding of John's original statement.

"What are you afraid of, Cam?"

"Loosing you," she responded with only a moments hesitation.

Both of them continued studying the other, their eyes circling countless times over the others face. John let his fingers slip free and kneed small circles on the palm of Cameron's hand.

"Sucks doesn't it," John asked her.

Cameron's face looked questionable at best, "What sucks?"

"Everything"

"Telle est la vie" Cameron leaned down and planted a small kiss on his lips.

"Telle est la vie" John repeated as she parted lips with his and lay back down on the bed.

* * *

**8:08AM**

* * *

The two girls were cleaning up the remnants of breakfast while John was getting a few moments of sleep. Cameron was watching while propped up against the wall next to the bathroom door. Her position gave an advantageous view of the entire room; she could see everyone in her field of view.

Her head snatched up a little at what Claire had said, "I wouldn't try that."

Claire froze in her steps and carefully set the large knife back down on the counter. She backed off slowly as if being held at gunpoint by a police-officer. Cameron kept her gaze un-emotional but hinted at the threat that she had laced her words with.

"Cameron," Sarah said while laying a hand on Claire's shoulder, "you don't have to do that."

"She doesn't have to mutter about stabbing one of us then running away," Cameron retorted, not dropping her gaze from the now nearly shaking Claire.

Sarah dropped her hand and strolled across the room to stand in Cameron's face in less then three steps. Her eyes were giving that familiar steel-eyed stare that Cameron was all too used to from John's mother. _It is strange how little it takes to change __someone, _she thought jokingly.

"You remember what you told me in the garage," Sarah said, her voice just above an audible whisper. Her eyes remained locked on Cameron, who averted hers and rested them on John.

"I do," she replied.

"Do you think he'd want you doing that?"

Cameron relaxed her stance at that statement from Sarah. Her mind was flashing back to the conversation in the garage that she had been referring to.

"How are we supposed to do that, if nobody trusts us," Sarah stepped back and crossed her hands across her chests. Almost as if striking an 'I told you so' pose while talking to a child.

"Sorry about that," Cameron said to Claire, still looking at the young woman in front of her with a slight smile on her face.

"Uh-huh," Claire replied with a hesitant whisper.

Sarah looked a little proud of herself and walked back over to help Claire with the few dishes in the sink. Cameron remained there at her vantage point, staring at the floor while her mind was thinking about what Sarah had said. The room was being filled by John's small intakes of breath when a dog began barking down the street.

John bolted up from the bed faster then anyone in the room could see him other then Cam. He had slid across Claire and Sarah's bed and was looking through the curtains of the rooms window before the girls in the kitchen even had time to react.

His eyes were darting back and forth across the area where the dog seemed to be barking from, but they saw nothing. After a few moments he saw the dog. It was a hundred or so yards away from the building they were in, across the street, and emerging from an alleyway. What it was barking at was much more interesting, a broad-shouldered man, that appeared to be very over-dressed for the occasion of just walking around. If John didn't already have his suspicions he would have swore the guy was one of the agents out of the matrix or something.

"Cam," John said, keeping his eyes attached to the man, who had now stopped and was studying the dog.

"Do you think its him?" Cameron asked, already moving forward carefully towards the window.

"Could be," he replied.

Claire started hyperventilating at the unknown danger of the man outside that John was staring at. John raised one of his hands and made a snapping motion with his fingers, trying to get her to quiet down. From what he could gather, the audio receptors on T-888's were sophisticated but he didn't know if the thing would be able to hear them from its current location.

Sarah moved over and was trying to reassure the girl when John and Cameron peered outside of the window again. Both of them were completely still, further adding to Claire's near hysteria in the kitchen.

"2014?" John asked, shifting his eyes from Cameron to the man outside.

"2014," she said after a few moments of calculation.

"Right," John stood back up and walked away from the window. "The car is in the back, you guys stand in that corner." The two girls in the kitchen looked at the corner John was pointing to and moved to it almost immediately.

"Cam..."

"I'm on it," She cut him off and began walking towards the bathroom before John grabbed her arm.

"Stay here and tell us when he's close," John said assuredly.

"You don't need me to?"

John half-smiled and chuckled, "I can handle it." He gave her arm a slight squeeze before heading over to their bed again.

He bent down and came back up with a sledgehammer, before heading in to the bathroom.

"Is he far enough away?" John asked, heaving the large hammer up above his shoulder, aiming it at the outside wall.

"Yes," Cameron told him, taking a look to confirm that the man was still relatively near the dog down the road. She kept watching him for a few moments before pulling her eyes from the window and to the girls standing in the corner.

"Sarah?" Cameron said.

'_thunk' _The sound of John's first contact with the wall made a small thud that was surprisingly muffled by the buildings structure.

"Yea," came her reply from the corner of the room.

_'thunk'_

"Get me a large bowl of water, a large bowl," Cameron said before looking back outside. "John he's coming this way."

"I'm almost there," John said in-between heaving the hammer back up into position.

Sarah came from around the kitchen-counter holding a large bowl of water, splashing a little of it in the floor as she walked.

_'thunk'_

"Okay, what do you need this for?" Sarah said, holding the bowl carefully with both hands.

"Thanks, stand back" Cameron said, taking another look outside while taking the bowl from Sarah.

"Forty yards, John," Cameron looked at Sarah, who had now backed halfway across the room, and poured the water down in front of the door.

_'thunk'_

"The hell're you doing?" Sarah said, looking at Cameron as if she was crazy.

"Buying us time," she replied, taking a step towards the door.

"_Cameron!_" Sarah hissed.

_'thunk'_

"It's okay," Cameron said, giving a small nod to her, "I've done this before."

Her hand grabbed the doorknob and turned it, opening the door. She took a few steps outside, trying not to go too far from the door but also putting herself fully in the T-888's viewpoint. It was now nearly thirty yards from the building and it caught her squarely in its sights.

The machine stopped for a moment, obviously analyzing her and catching sight of her wounds, then changed its course of direction to their doorway. Cameron allowed herself to smile internally, but outwardly remained emotionless and stepped back inside the room.

_'thunk'_

"Okay," John said from the bathroom as quietly as he could from his heavy breathing, "let's go."

The girls in the corner made no attempt to further study what Cameron was doing and bolted for the bathroom door. John rushed the girls out through the massive hole and ran to the car. When they were safe in the backseat he turned to not see Cameron emerging through the wall, _the hell are you, Cam?_

John raced back inside and entered the bathroom door, stopping dead in his tracks. Cameron was standing a few feet away from the remains of the door. It had been knocked off its hinges by the T-888 which now stood menacingly in the doorway.

"CAM" John shouted at her.

She didn't move, but the T-888 turned and began scanning this new appearance in the room.

Threat ID: Unknown

Threat Level: Minimal

It turned its gaze back to Cameron.

"Make a choice," she said, still firmly standing her ground.

The machine seemed to consider her words for a moment before taking a step towards her, its hand was outstretched and ready to grab her.

John watched in shock as Cameron didn't move, she merely made a sliding motion with her foot, and the machine stood still. It jerked heavily, as if held by magnetism before slumping down in the floor.

"The hell were you thinking," John said, running over to her.

"Giving it a choice," Cameron replied calmly. "Will you join us?"

John looked at her incredulously, "Cam, we need to get out of here."

"Not right now," she said, taking a hold of his arm firmly. "Now you have a choice; let it be or remove the chip?"

Her eyes were studying him and his were studying her. They stood there for what seemed like forever, but it only took him a few moments to respond.

"Let it be," he said, with a slight smile.

"Then we'd better go, it'll reboot soon."

"How'd you manage to incapacitate it?" John asked, taking her hand and walking outside the hole in the wall.

"Electricity transferred from the broken alarm clock wire to the water I soaked the carpet in," Cameron said a little proudly, "its very simply but highly effective."

To Be Continued...

* * *

Thanks for reading!  
Comments and critiques welcome.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

* * *

**St. Michael's Bed & Breakfast**

**Nevada**

**August 28, 1985 7:27 AM**

* * *

"You know we need to move don't you?" Sarah said to John quietly. It was an early morning hour and she was intent on not waking the other guests in the home. "We've stayed here for too long, and we still haven't got Kyle out of there!" she finished off with a hiss.

"Mo..." John stopped short of finishing the word, "Sarah. Today is our last day, alright?" He finished scrapping the last of the peanut butter onto his piece of toast and put the empty jar into the trash bin. "And Kyle is going to have to stay there."

"WHAT," came a violent hiss from behind him.

The only thing John felt like doing was staring at the peanut butter container in the bottom of the waste bin. Even after years experience in the war with Skynet he didn't feel like facing down his mother when she was in a mood. But he knew he had to.

"Look, its been too long. We had to leave him in there to give him time to heal from his injuries." John pointed to the long scar running down the left side of his face, "Do you want him winding up like this? Or worse? What if we gave him sub-par treatment and he died? What if he got a blood infection?"

He leaned against the counter-top and stared out into Las Vegas in the distance. Sarah seemed to ease off a small bit but she still wasn't ready to back down, and John could sense that.

"It was either break him out of there in the first days, which would have lead to him probably dying from his wounds. Or we let him heal and get released, he knows how to find us."

"They aren't _going_ to release him, John! You know that! You _should_ know that! He isn't just some random person that walked into the hospital. He was dropped off with a hole in his stomach, bleeding all over the place, oh and he just happened to be involved in a house-fire where you two decided to kidnap a girl from the neighborhood."

"They have nothing on him that would make him have to stay in police-custody." John reiterated. "I grew up in foster-homes and the other half of my time was in police-custody. The only thing they have right now is a suspicion that he's involved with something about the girl."

John turned to face Sarah, who still seemed on-edge about the entire situation, "The only thing they can possibly do is release him when he's healed, question him again, and then follow him for a few days to see if their suspicions are true."

Sarah seemed to ease down from her imposing stance, but John could still see the hatred in her eyes, "Why did you two even bring her along anyway? She's doing nothing but slowing us down, and narrowing our options on places to hide."

"Who said we were hiding," John said with a smirk as Cameron walked into the room with a tired expression on her face. "G'morning."

"Good morning," Cameron returned the gesture with a gentle kneading of her forehead.

"Bad dream?" John asked.

Cameron nodded in reply and took the piece of toast from John's outstretched hand. She nibbled on the edge of it for a moment before looking at Sarah.

John's mother seemed to be at ease with her presence now. Still hesitant about some things of course, but at least she didn't freeze-up as soon as Cameron walked into the room anymore.

"Tough night, Sarah?" she took another nibble of toast.

"You're healing nicely," Sarah replied with a harsh tone, but she wasn't paying any attention or thought to Cameron with her words. They were focused on John when she turned and left the kitchen in a half-stomp towards the stairs.

"Thank you," said Cameron even though Sarah was out of earshot. "She's starting to come around," she noted while nibbling at the piece of toast again.

"She's starting to be more and more like I remember her," John said with a look of concern on his face.

"The bags are packed and in the car," Cameron stated, placing a hand on his cheek to tear his thoughts away from Sarah.

"She's gonna be fine right?" John said, finally laying his eyes on Cameron.

"I'm more concerned about you at the moment," she replied, wrapping her free arm around his back to give him a hug. Cameron continued chewing on her nibble of toast while she laid her head against his shoulder.

"She's right you know?" John said in a teasing manner, "you are healing nicely."

"With all this protein and other vital materials here, I've been healing ahead of schedule. Though my arm still has the appearance of a badly burned trauma victim." She grimaced down at it while she talked to John.

"At least you can't see through the skin anymore" John chuckled, "There are only so many excuses for wearing opera gloves or long socks on your arms before people start to notice that somethings _off_."

"People have started noticing, but nobody has talked directly to me about it yet." Cameron said, finishing off her piece of toast with a large bite.

"Well that is a good thing, Cam. The less people pay us attention, the better we are at doing our jobs of staying under-the-radar." John gave her a small kiss on the crown of her head and ruffled her hair slightly. "Come one, we better go get Claire."

* * *

**A Short While Later**

* * *

The three piled together in John's car and pulled away from the house they had been staying in for the past five days. Claire seemed to take it the hardest. Ever since they had arrived, she had clung to the place as if she were glued into the house. Whenever John went out, she never offered to leave anymore, even though she couldn't come to begin with.

Cameron was driving, with Claire and Sarah sitting together in the front seat with her, leaving John behind in the backseat to get some well deserved sleep. For all that Cameron knew, he had been on watch for the past eighty hours. It wasn't anything new. They had often stayed awake during the war for up to one-hundred hours before. But every body has its limits, a sobering factor as Cameron looked down at the glove that still covered her damaged arm.

"Where are we headed to now?" Sarah asked, biting her thumb and looking out of the window at the passing scenery.

Claire looked eager to know that information as well. The truth was however, that Cameron had no idea. There was no plan. She could tell them the name of the motel they would be staying in, but as far as going beyond that protocol she didn't have a clue as to what they were going to do.

"The other side of the city, looking for a motel on the outskirts," Cameron replied, shifting the car into its last gear as it gathered more speed. The motor replied in kind by humming along in a loud and ferocious fashion.

"So we just keep running," Claire finally spoke for the first time in days.

Cameron disregarded her hair blowing from the open windows and turned to answer the girls question, "Right now we have nothing else to do."

Sarah looked unchanged from that information, but Claire seemed to be pouting at the idea of spending the unforeseen future holed up in various motels across the city.

"Some hero fighters you guys are, can't even come up with a plan," Claire crossed her arms and looked out at the road in front of them which was being thrown to the winds from the speed of the car.

"We have a plan, stop Skynet." Cameron reasserted, "We only have that much information to go on though. We have next to no resources in this time other then ourselves."

Cameron looked around the front seat of the car and gestured to the two girls sitting next to her.

"Take Sarah for example, a young waitress in her twenties who, up until a few days ago, had never held a weapon in her life. And now you, a teenage-girl, who has never had to do anything in your life. Everything has been done for you." She allowed herself to feel a little annoyed at the prospect of harboring two untrained individuals with them, "Both of you are unprepared to fight a machine right now."

"I've had training," Sarah replied hotly, "Self-defense course at the YMCA. Not to mention Kyle was helping me with the weapons training before..."

"That isn't what I'm talking about, Sarah," Cameron replied. "Have you ever had to deal with something that wouldn't stop? No matter what you threw at it, no matter what it was, the thing would just keep on coming?"

"Life," Sarah grumbled and returned to chewing on her nails while looking at the scenery outside the car.

A few minutes of silence took over the occupants of the car. Only the roar of the wind coming from the windows and the occasional snore from John were the only sounds that were discernible.

"You know that isn't what I mean, Sarah." Cameron said finally, breaking the tension, "Look at John in the backseat."

Even though Cameron hadn't meant for them to literally look, both Sarah and Claire threw their heads back and caught a glimpse of the snoozing John.

"He's been at war with the machines since before he was born. John is in his mid-twenties now. For nearly a quarter of a century he has been fighting them, and they still persevere. He's destroyed Skynet three times in the past, to the point where it should have ceased to exist at all, yet here we are fighting the same battle."

"When he was in command we lost 76,925 lives in the fight to stop Skynet, not to mention the billions who died in the initial attack. On a personal level he's lived to see his mother die, his uncle perish, close friends, foster parents, and his father was murdered three days after his mother and father even met. You think he likes running around the city without a plan?"

"If we were both in our own times, we could use countless resources to find and destroy this thing. In 1985, short of going to the police, we are on our own. He's having to not only fight a war with the machines but he is having to do it while thinking about your safety," Cameron looked back at Sarah and Claire.

"He's had to deal with the fact that he lost one of his best soldiers, and he doesn't even have the capabilities to get him back. Right now, even though we may not like it, we're stuck to a life on the road."

Claire and Sarah were watching Cameron as she fell back into silence. Both of them were absorbing everything she had said.

"You used to be one of them," Sarah said quietly, "If it were you, what would you be doing."

Cameron didn't have to run any diagnostics to know what she'd bedoing. It had happened once before on John's birthday. Even though she didn't like having them, the memories were scorched into her CPU.

"Revert to basic programming. Primary target had been acquired. Seek and Destroy routine would be in effect," she said without a hint of emotion.

"Ah.."

"If subjects were unable to be found, secondary programming would take over." Cameron turned and gave off a very creepy stare in the direction of the two girls seated next to her. It wasn't something she necessarily wanted to do, but she felt they needed a wake-up call to the ruthlessness of the machines.

"Secondary programming?" Sarah asked, goosebumps forming on her arms from Cameron's stare.

"Find a secure location, activate stand-by mode. Wait for the targets to present themselves."

"What does that mean?" Claire asked worriedly.

"It means if it can't find us, then he hides and waits for us to show ourselves. Right?" Sarah said, shifting her eyes from Claire to Cameron.

"Yes."

* * *

The vehicle pulled to a stop at a gas station on the edge of town. The neon glow from Las Vegas was already begin to light up the night sky, casting an eerie glow as they moved further away from the city.

Claire and Sarah were pumping the gas while Cameron walked into the store to pay and get something for them all to eat. She passed up and down the aisle of the store with the shopping cart, looking for things that would be the most nutritional for them to snack on until they reached a motel to nest in for the time being.

She heard the bell on the door ding and casually looked up to see John, groggy and looking like death incarnate, waltzing into the store. Cameron semi-smiled and went back to picking out a brand of potato-chips that she knew Sarah liked. John spotted Cameron shopping and started walking towards her from his position near the door.

"Hey," he said, wiping a bit of sleep from his eyes, "how long was I out?"

"A few hours," Cameron nodded outside at the darkening sky.

"Shit, I was out all day? I thought..."

"They needed to get out, John" Cameron said, placing a bag of chips in the cart and looking back up at him, "They need a bit of normalcy and a break from all this."

"What did you guys do..."

"Relax, we did nothing to give our positions up. They wanted a break, and I offered them one. You were perfectly content to sleep in the car." Cameron smiled as she walked around and started picking out soft-drinks from the coolers.

John sighed and fell into line behind her, briefly scanning the contents of the cooler. His heart shrank when he saw no energy drinks, or soft-drinks in general that he was used to having. "Would it kill them to make some Surge? Or Rockstar every now and then?"

"1985, John," Cameron replied with a tease, grabbing four cokes from the nearest cooler and slipping them into the cart. "Anything else you want?"

John glanced over the contents of the cart she was holding but paid it no attention, "You didn't have to do that earlier you know?"

Cameron looked a little confused, "The break?"

"No," John nodded towards the two girls pumping their gas and gossiping to each other, "tell them everything. I don't like being seen as some prophet or something. I wasn't asleep during everything you know..."

"They had a right to know what they were getting into," Cameron said, grabbing some stick of beef-jerky for her protein intake and placing the cart on the counter.

"Eleven-fifty in gas miss," the attendant eyed John carefully before ringing up the items in Cameron's cart.

She waited for the total and handed the man the appropriate amount of money before heading out of the store with John following her.

"Maybe, but don't you think it was a little risky? Telling mom how she died and all? I mean its not like she knows that shes my mom, but its still kinda wrong isn't it?" John said, falling into stride beside Cameron as they headed towards the car.

"She already knows," Cameron said, "I already told her that long ago. Before any of this even happened."

John took hold of Cameron's arm and stopped her pace towards the car, "You did _what!?_"

"The talk in the garage, when she freaked at the house. I told her who I was, who you were, and her role in the future. She had a right to know."

Cameron resumed her constant strides toward the car as John stood there, watching the two girls pull the pump from the car. Claire looked happy, for a change, and climbed into the car willingly.

Johns eyes focused on Sarah as she placed the pump back into its holder and screwed the gas cap back on. Their eyes locked from across the parking lot as she looked up. He could see the hard expression on her face, one which he knew all too well. She gave him a small but understanding nod as she walked around the rear of the car and climbed into the backseat with Claire.

"Shit..." John muttered.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

* * *

**Holiday Inn: Room 479**

**Nevada**

**August 30, 1985 8:59 PM**

* * *

"Can we talk?" Cameron asked, already taking hold of Johns hand and leading him towards the door.

"Uh, sure," John stuttered as Cameron opened it and they stepped outside.

John turned to close the door, giving them what little bit of privacy that Cameron was obviously trying to have. It was a dry but cool night for August in the American Southwest. It didn't compare to the bleak environment that the either of them had grown accustomed to since Judgment Day, but the bite of the cool breeze was enough to send a few chills up and down John's arms.

"I want to go," Cameron said abruptly, calling his attention away from the cold wind nipping at John's limbs.

"Cam, we literally just got here." John threw a hand behind her back and pulled her closer to him.

"I know," she said, gently resisting his attempt to try and ease her mind at the moment.

It was something that had been in her thoughts ever since the room had been booked no less then three hours ago. John's choice of location was strategically perfect and there was no fault that she could find with the place at all. _A human intuition,_ she mocked herself as she turned her head and let the cool breeze blow over her face. For a moment she forgot about her gut feelings of wanting to pack up and leave, letting the air snake its way through her hair as it waved in the wind.

"I just have a feeling..." she started.

"Like something isn't right," John continued her train of thought, leaning against the railing of the motel that separated the walkway from the parking lot out in front. "Well things have been getting a little weird, but then again weird to me is normal...so for now," he leaned over and planted a kiss on her forehead, "lets just rest for the night, okay?"

"Weird is normal, is it?" Cameron quirked up a crooked smile and arched one of her eyebrows at him.

"Well, pretty much always," John teased as Cameron leaned against the parking lot railing next to him.

"To me things just took on a whole new level of weird. Knowing that my mom is aware that she's my mom, yet I haven't technically been born yet," he sighed.

"She needed to know..." Cameron replied, leaning into John's chest with her back.

"I know, I..." John's voice trailed off for a moment before he pulled his thoughts together again, "I just...hoped, that the time for that would have been a lot further down the road. After all this mess was taken care of, not while we were in the middle of it."

Cameron pushed her back into John's chest and felt the warmth that radiated from him. The cars on the street were blurring by them while they stood there. Off in the distance, the lights from Vegas were piercing the sky with their fluorescent glow. Beams of light stretched up until you couldn't see them anymore, and the entire city seemed to glow from their brightness.

"How do you think it's going to end this time?" Cameron asked after a few minutes of silence between the two of them.

"Hopefully?"

Cameron responded with a small purr.

"Well, hopefully this is the last one. Truth be told though, I don't know what to do with _it_. I mean when the time comes down to it," John followed up to her question by crossing his arms around her.

"Well what do you think we should do?" she asked, leaning into him, making the wood railing groan from the pressure it was now under.

"Everything I've been trained to do tells me to destroy it, but what if it turns out to one day be like you? What if it has thoughts," John said.

"It doesn't work that way with us, John. You know that," Cameron said, letting out a sigh.

"Well you can at least see what I'm talking about," John chuckled.

"John, the chips are set to read only when a unit is sent out on a solo mission," Cameron said in her scary robot voice, which produced laughter from John. "Even if it has the capability to one day think, learn, and comprehend humanity; right now the only thing it is _thinking_ about doing is destroying you."

"I thought we decided to let it be a few days ago?" John returned her tease with his tone of voice imitating her own.

"John, we gave it a choice and it declined that choice. What we have to do now is work within the reality of that choice," Cameron began rubbing her hands with Johns across her stomach.

"That unit is coming for us, for you. It isn't going to stop or slow down, and everyone caught in the way is going to be collateral damage," her eyes flew to the window where Sarah and Claire were enjoying the carryout pizza the girls had ordered earlier.

"What we _can _do is either; destroy it before it kills us, or incapacitate it and preserve the chip while destroying the body," she lifted one of John's hands up and kissed the back of his palm while their fingers intertwined.

"Letting the chip survive is risky, but potentially could have its benefits," John said after a moments pause.

Cameron took a step away from John before turning to face him, "My entire existence is a risk, everyday John."

John scoffed at the idea by rolling his eyes and looking towards the street while she continued talking.

"Do you _know_ what will happen? If..."

"If what, Cam?" John remained fixated on the street of passing cars, failing to direct his attention fully towards her. "If you're found out? Or captured? Or some _part_ breaks down and needs replacing? That's what you have me for..."

"We can plan anything to the extreme outcomes until the end of time, John. Nothing ever happens according to plan. The random variables of life get in the way of that ever happening the way we plan it."

"Your mother was attacked, 1984. Twelve years later, a damaged _chip, _lead to the near-extinction of the entire human race," Cameron could see he was about to protest but continued on anyway, cutting him off before he had a chance to utter a syllable.

"Disaster was averted because you managed to destroy the main Cyberdyne facility, but once something starts you can't stop it. Its the inevitability of time, John. 2009 was the new Judgment Day, but our attempts in the past lead to the minor postponing of what? A year?"

"What are you trying to say? That its not worth even trying to salvage something?" John turned and looked at her in a way he hadn't since Riley had died. He felt completely disgusted with himself right now, but at the same time he couldn't help but be disgusted by what Cam was saying.

Cameron paused for a moment, "I'm saying that when the time comes if you decide to keep the chip, I want you to know the risk you are taking for every person on this planet. Because the last time a chip survived, it lead to the inevitable being known as Skynet."

"Well now that we're on the subject," John kicked himself up from the railing and crossed his arms, "I want to run something by you."

"I'm all ears," Cameron said, paying full attention to him now.

"Mom was attacked," John's eyes flew to the window where his mother was sitting behind Cameron's shoulder, "and in twelve years that lead to the end of the world because of a chip."

"But John Henry, he is proof that you can teach an AI something. He couldn't hurt a fly even if you asked him to, because he's been _taught_ how to respect life. Even you, _you_ would never kill billions of people. Because you've learned about humanity, and weighed the risks at your own accord."

"Skynet was created as a military computer system, meant to breed death and destruction." John reached out and put his hands on Cameron's shoulders, "What if an AI were created simply to _be_ and exist. It wouldn't have a set purpose, just teach it laws and ethics; just like Ellison did. Think of the benefits to humanity it would have, to be in contact with an ally like John Henry before any of this stuff ever happened with mom."

"That is a stretch of an idea, John. Not to mention the risk you'd be taking..."

"Just like the risk I took with handing you the gun, right?" John's glance turned to steel, the likes of which would have sent chills down even his mother's spine.

"Machines follow protocols right? But you are able to think for yourself, you were able to choose not to kill me when I handed you the gun. Right before we were going to melt your ass with thermite."

"John..." Cameron started before being cut off by John.

"Tell me, Cam. _Tell _me how it is any different?"

Cameron tried to look at him in the face right now but she just couldn't. She didn't want to see the look in his eyes when she told him.

"Because you don't know, nor never will know what _it_ is ever truly thinking," Cameron let John's hands fall and walked back over to the railing, leaning on it while looking out at the city in the distance.

"You've never been one to shy away from telling me what you're thinking..." John retorted.

"Because I feel _comfortable_ in telling you things, but there are some things that even you don't know," she said.

John threw his hands in the air, "_Like what?_"

Cameron took a deep breath of unneeded air, "Like how every-time I saw you after I handed the gun back to you, I had the directives to kill you. Every _single time, _John."

John halted from walking over to her for a moment, having never heard this from her before. "Every time?"

"There were times," her eyes shut from trying to block out the visual data replaying itself over her HUD but it did no good, "there were times when I grabbed weapons, knives, anything that could kill you. I stood outside your room until Derek or Sarah would tell me to go fold the laundry, or do something else around the house to justify me being there."

"Whenever we went out together, I had to unload the clip from my weapon to at least give you a chance of running away if I slipped. You might think that letting something survive because it might be good is a noble thing to do," she turned and looked at him, "but it isn't. I'm asking you now, that when the times comes to destroy the unit..._destroy it_."

"Cam, I..." John made a movement to try and comfort her but she moved out of the way.

"I need a shower," she said, deflecting the situation and giving John the opportunity to think about what she had told him. "Don't forget to check the phones, remember?"

"Yea," he said, shoulders sagging, "I'll run and do it now."

He watched as she moved for the door and began to open it before getting the guts to speak again, "Cam?"

"Yes?" Cameron let out a sigh to hide the fact that she was on the verge of crying in front of him.

"You said that letting something exist, even if it has the capabilities to do bad things is too much of a risk. But that is just life, Cam. Every person on the planet has the capabilities to become the next creator of the atomic bomb, or the next Adolf Hitler. It's the choices and how we are taught that determine what kind of person we're going to be. That's the most human thing about us, that is the core of our humanity."

And with that, John turned and started walking across the parking lot to the sidewalk. His arms were freezing and his thoughts were all over the place but he didn't care. Right now he needed to check on the phones, and let Cameron be alone for the time being.

* * *

Cameron watched him walk down the street and disappear around the corner before turning the doorknob and walking inside. Sarah and Claire took immediate notice of her presence, though Claire was still keeping her distance when it came to Cameron being near physically near her.

"Somebody was out there for awhile," Sarah remarked, trying to break the ice.

"I..I need a shower," Cameron said, not looking at either girl but heading straight for her bag of clothes. She ruffled through them and selected a few things to wear to bed before standing up and heading for the bathroom door.

"Everything okay? Need any help with your arm bandage?" Sarah asked, getting up from the table next to the window.

"No," Cameron replied, still not casting a glance towards the girls, "Thanks for offering, but I just need a shower."

She closed the door behind her and set her things on the counter next to the sink. Cameron noticed a slight twitch in her hand muscle, which shocked her, but she decided to ignore it and turned on the water letting it begin to warm up. Her clothes fell to the floor, but she made no attempt to enter the shower. Steam and mist began filling the room before she walked over to the sink and looked up at herself in the mirror. Both hands rested on the edge of the counter as she leaned onto it for support.

Her eye makeup had started streaking down her cheeks from the tears that had been hid by her hair. The slight spasm in her hand occurred again, making the hard counter-top crack. Cameron flinched and shut her eyes, silently chastising herself for breaking something and muttering curses under her breath. A full minute went by before she opened her eyes and looked up into the mirror again.

"Goddammit, John."

* * *

The door opened to the room and both Sarah and Claire looked up to see an excited looking John enter. To Sarah, it looked like he was trying to contain himself but he was obviously happy about something.

"Where's Cam?" He asked, relaxing from the warmth of the room.

"In the shower," Claire responded, "She's been in there since _forever_."

"Ah..." John looked over at the door but made no move to walk towards it.

"John," Sarah tried to get his attention by waving her hand in front of his face, "did you check the phones yet?"

Her hand snapped him out of his gaze and back into reality as John turned and looked at his young mother, "Yea, uh, yea I did."

"And..." Sarah asked, ripe with anticipation.

"He's made it out," John watched as relief and joy began to overtake Sarah's face, "I gave him the address. He said he'll be here before sundown, tomorrow."

Claire raised an eyebrow, "The guy who got rushed to the hospital right?"

Sarah turned to look at her," Kyle..."

"Hey uh, I"m gonna go check on Cam," John motioned towards the bathroom door, "You two all good?"

"Yea, sure," Sarah said, still taking in the information of Kyle's impending return.

John turned the knob on the door and found it to be unlocked. He took a deep breath of air before walking inside the bathroom. It took a moment for his eyes to see anything through the dense layer of mist and steam that was in the room. _Might as well be a rainforest,_ he thought to himself while he fanned fog away from his face.

His hand knocked into the counter-top and he looked down at it. Small droplets of blood were growing on the knuckle that collided with the piece of furniture and were falling to the floor. John ran his hand smoothly across the top of the counter and felt a small crack that ran from the wall-mounted mirror to the edge.

_Aw shit,_ John thought as he took off his shirt and threw it on the floor. He could finally make out Cameron's form faintly through the fog in the room. She appeared to be sitting in the tub,with her knees under her chin.

Paying no attention to his pants, John walked over and slid the glass door open and stepped inside. Cameron didn't seem to notice that he'd entered the shower, and continued to let the water pelt her scalp, letting it trickle down her face and back as she stared at the bottom of the tub.

John sat down across from her and noticed for the first time that he still had his socks and jeans on. The water made loud contact sounds with them which was the only sound that could be heard in the room. He sat there for a moment before reaching over and rubbing her left shoulder.

Cameron responded by leaning her head over onto his hand and reaching up to take hold of his arm with her right hand. She only had to make a small motion with her left arm for John to slide her body towards his. He wrapped his arms around her as she settled into his chest while the water continued to rain down on them.

"Kyle's coming home," He finally said, whispering in her ear.

"I know," she replied, "I heard from when you arrived."

She noticed the blood coming from his knuckles and rubbed her fingers over the wound gently. Cameron watched as the blood was swept away by her finger and the water, only to have new blood accumulate after a moments notice. She did this multiple times and the blood always returned, streaming down John's hand and coloring the water in the bottom of the tub to a pinkish color.

"Counter?"

"Counter," John replied, watching her thumb over the blood again and again.

"Do you really think its worth risking the chip?" she said, watching the blood well up again but not wiping it away.

"I do, if the opportunity was there to take it with no relative harm to anyone."

Cameron put her palm over John's hand and wove her fingers with his, forming a bond to stop the bleeding on his hand permanently. _Then so be it..._

* * *

Thanks for reading!

To Be Continued...


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

* * *

**Holiday Inn: Room 479**

**Nevada**

**August 31, 1985 6:20 AM**

* * *

Sarah woke early and after a few stifled yawns mixed with relaxing stretches she managed to pull herself out of bed. Last night she had fallen asleep next to Claire who was still laying next to her and snoozing away into her pillow. From the time that they had spent together Sarah knew that Claire was a heavy sleeper. Nothing short of Cameron bursting her way through one of the walls would wake her up, she was willing to bet from firsthand experience.

After taking in a few breaths of air, Sarah stood and stretched her stiff joints again. That was one by-product of constantly moving around that she hadn't grown accustomed to yet, conditioning her body to sleep quite literally on a different surface every night. Up until now she had put it to the back of her mind that her body would simply adjust, but the sore neck and stiff back were saying otherwise. It was just something that she was going to have to get used to, and she had come to terms with that.

The suns rays were peeping in through the curtains at the front of the room. A soft glow seeped through the material of the fabric and still managed to light up the room even though the curtains were fully closed. The glow was very soft but noticeable in the otherwise dark room, which made Sarah saunter over to the door and turn on the lights. Everything in the room was left exactly how she remembered it being last night after she received the news that Kyle was returning today. That left her with a suspicious concern over John and Cameron, as neither of them were occupying the empty bed near the bathroom door.

With one last stretch, Sarah walked the short distance over to the window and opened it to the morning view of Vegas in the background. Cars were still streaming to and fro on the street outside. She paused a moment and looked out over the city, taking in the morning haze that still lingered like a damp cloud.

_Just like L.A., it never sleeps,_ Sarah thought as she let out what she was determined to be her final yawn of the morning. She looked down in front of the small table next to the window and opened the pizza box from last night. It had been only Claire and Sarah who were eating, and there remained half a pizza inside the box. Sarah picked up a smaller slice and took a bite while sitting down and looking out at the city in the distance.

All the streaming cars and people shuffling about their day cast eerie thoughts over her mind. She couldn't help but think of every person she saw and what their plans were, not only for today but the rest of their lives. The man in the sweat pants and jogging shirt that ran past with his walkman blaring, or the young mother who was pushing her baby in the stroller while walking towards a fast food eatery. To Sarah they all had plans and dreams of their own, all of which were resting on the shoulders of the four people inside the motel room.

As if the aroma of the food had coerced her awake, Claire sat up in the bed and groggily looked in Sarah's direction.

"Time is it?" She asked groggily, still rubbing her eyes.

"Almost half past six," Sarah replied after looking down at her watch. "Sleep well?"

"Bout the same as always," responded Claire with a passive laugh. "Haven't been getting much sleep since...ya know."

Sarah eyed Claire like she was waiting for the girl to continue her train-of-thought but the girl never did. She knew what Claire was trying to say, it was something that she had recently been dealing with as well.

"You mean since, you found out about Cameron?" Sarah munched on another bite of her pizza and waited for Claire to respond.

"Yea, I mean. How long did it take you to be able to not constantly have an eye on her all the time?" Claire let a few moments linger, not sure of whether to keep talking or if she should stop before the machine overheard them.

"What do you mean?" Sarah asked, taking another bite of the pizza. She knew what the girl was talking about, but right now she needed to hear it from Claire herself. It wasn't a secret that the girl had been a little mistrusting of Cameron, hell even Sarah herself had taken nearly a month before she would not think about trying to put a bullet in the girl.

Claire looked like she was trying to avoid saying what she was wanting to say. She kept shifting her arms and legs around in the bed, and her eyes kept focusing on everything in the room but Sarah. After a couple of seconds of uncomfortable silence she sat straight in the bed and did her best 'scary robot' impersonation of Cameron's death stare.

"Being near her."

"Thats it? You sure its nothing else?" Sarah asked with a little bit of skepticism. But Claire responded with a simple nod and shrug of her shoulders.

Sarah sighed and looked out the window again, "Well it took some getting used to, but she isn't going to hurt you. That is the thing you have to remember."

"Right," Claire said without even a hint of confidence while grabbing a slice of pizza.

"Well its easier for me I guess, I knew her before I found out what she was," flashes of memory began reliving themselves in front of Sarah's eyes, making her wish that she could go back to the happy-go-lucky life she used to have. "I can just imagine her as I used to know her and that calms me down most of the time."

"How do you know she can be trusted though?" Claire gave Sarah a look of both concern and desperation. "And don't just say its because he does, thats like the lamest excuse ever. I mean, she walks around here with a gun at all times. It isn't like they exactly _asked _me to come along, you know?"

Sarah chuckled then took a moment to think over what the girl had said. It was true the other then knowing for a fact that both John and Cameron were from the future, she had no proof that Cameron could be trusted. Deep down though, she could feel it in her gut that the machine didn't mean anyone harm. It was a small instinctual feeling, but it was enough to speak volumes.

"Well you've seen what she is," Sarah asked and received a nod from Claire, "and you know that she can't possibly exist in this time. She's also never tried to kill you, nor me."

Sarah again received a nod from Claire, "Then if _she_ is real, then John and Kyle are also real. If all three of them are real, then Skynet is real. And if Skynet is real..." She left it for the girl to fill in the blanks. They had all taken turns trying to explain to her everything that was _supposed_ to happen. Right now she figured it was best for Claire to answer the question herself.

"So if this is really happening, why am I here?" asked Claire, wolfing down the last of her bite of pizza.

"That is the million dollar question, kiddo. I have no idea. Better for you to ask one of them then me," replied Sarah with a sympathetic sigh.

The thought had crossed her mind before, but she had never pushed it with John or Cameron. John seemed just as perplexed and lost as Claire and herself were whenever Sarah brought up the situation with him. It seemed that the only one who knew why Claire was with the Connors was Cameron, and she absolutely refused to speak of it anytime the subject was brought up.

"Yo, Sarah?" Clare asked again, looking mildly annoyed.

"Yea? Sorry," Sarah snapped from her daze and focused back on the girl in front of her.

"Do you think they're..._together_?" Claire cupped her hands over her mouth and tried to whisper the last word to Sarah.

"I would think that is pretty obvious, Claire," Sarah chuckled while walking towards the kitchen sink to grab a glass of water.

Claire slouched back onto the bed with a disgusted look on her face, "eww."

Sarah tried to say nothing and hurriedly started drinking her water in hopes that Claire would drop the situation before it went any further. When the glass was empty and she set it on the counter however, it was clear that it was not going to be the case.

"You don't think that's...weird?"

"Listen," Sarah said, half-hoping that John and Cameron still weren't in the bathroom listening to them, "we're dealing with robots and soldiers from the future, time-travel, and God knows what else. If I can accept one version of weird, what is to say anything else is weirder."

"Ugh," Claire sighed, her hopes of getting information out of Sarah were destroyed, "I need to pee."

The young girl got up from the bed and walked over to the bathroom door, knocking as she stepped in front of it. Sarah watched then closed her eyes and hoped that Claire wasn't about to witness something that she wasn't ready for.

"Alright you two, you better be covered when I open the door," Claire took a breath then turned the doorknob.

Her eyes were clenched shut as she stepped into the room and her toes connected with the cool tile floor. Claire inched forward until her hands made contact with the counter-top and she opened her eyes. Her own reflection stared back at her from the mirror on the wall, but nothing else was throwing up a red flag as her eyes looked around. She took a step to the left and her foot stepped on something wet and cold.

_Eww, gross!_ She thought and her foot recoiled from the wet thing on the floor. _What the hell is it? _Claire asked herself as she peaked through her squinted eyelids.

_Blue jeans, okay,_ she told herself after Claire opened her eyes a little more and took a few breaths to calm down. _Nothing weird, Claire. Just blue jeans. Wet...cold...jeans,_ she turned around fast and covered her eyes with her hands. _Jeans on the floor means...ugh gross..._

"Okay, you two. Time to get out of..." Claire turned around and opened her eyes fully to an empty bathroom. Clothes were on the floor, both John and Cameron's, but neither of them were in the room.

Sarah walked into the doorway just as Claire turned around to see her, "Where'd they go?"

* * *

**Across the street**

**Ramada Inn: Room 238**

* * *

"You know, I don't think this is such a great idea, John." Cameron said, sliding the container of Asian noodles across the table in his direction.

"It was the plan all along, Cam. You knew that," he replied, reluctantly taking the container and helping himself to some much-needed food.

Cameron watched the two girls through the window as they started looking outside and shifting their gaze back and forth down the street. They turned up nothing in their search but always came back to the window and started looking again. After ten or so minutes, Cameron looked down at her container of tofu and then gave John a cold stare.

"Things do change sometimes, John," she took another bite of the tofu before continuing, "You should know that by now."

"What the hell else am I supposed to do?" John said, slamming the container of noodles down a little too hard on the table in between them, "Carter them around while we hunt down a cyborg that is hunting us down? Kyle will take care of them."

Cameron gave another look out across the street at the two girls still turning the room upside down in their search for their missing companions. Claire was there on a personal level for Cameron, but she could understand the trepidation for Sarah. The last time he had to say goodbye to her it had taken him nearly five months before he was even able to say her name again. But even after the pain and threat of perhaps experiencing it again, she still didn't feel right about leaving them with Kyle.

The younger Reese brother had been very integral to the war with Skynet, and the personal connections with John had given him something to look forward to seeing in the future for his mother. There were numerous times when Cameron had laid her life in the young man's hands, and times when he had laid his in hers; with her it wasn't a matter of trust. Right now the thing that was giving her trepidation was just what John had said; a cyborg was hunting them while they were hunting it.

Stark had identified John at some point or another, hence the attack on their old safe-house. Anything to do with John at the moment would be what the unit put all its focus and attention towards. It was what she would do as well, acquire her target then pursue it until all options were exhausted or mission achievement had been met.

When it came down to analyzing everything, she just didn't feel right with separating and splitting up. It was a maneuver that was both very costly in war, as well as high-risk. Very rarely in her experience did it lead to completion of a mission.

"John," she said, after having one more diagnostic running for a few nanoseconds.

"Yea?" John responded quietly, still mopping up the small mess of noodles that had spilled from his slamming the container down.

"I know we've been over this a thousand times, not to mention me going over it; but how do you think Stark was triggered?" She eyed him carefully, "A unit doesn't simply come online without a direct command, which isn't possible at this point in time."

"Why do you think I've been taking the night watch nearly every night?" John smirked, "I don't stay up for my health. I've been trying to figure that out too."

"So you're out of ideas also?"

John nodded reluctantly, "Yea...the thing I don't get. Is who woke up a unit and sent it out into the world with a mission?"

"You're certain it wasn't an accident?" Cameron said, swallowing her last bite of tofu in the process.

"An accident?" John looked a little perplexed at her question.

"Whoever triggered Stark" Cameron replied, "I've been trying to rule out everything that could have possibly happened."

"Can't have been an accident. You said that research you did in the past lead to finding out about an assassination mission for a future war asset." John waited for Cameron to nod in understanding before continuing.

"Well if it was an _accident_ that Stark was awoken, then he would have killed whoever woke him then went back into hibernation until his mission clock triggered him awake again. Whoever woke him up knew what he was, and knew just what to say to him so that they didn't wind up dead before they knew what hit them. But like you said," John took a breath of air, " the real question is who woke him up."

"And how do they know about us in this time-line?" Cameron replied to his question and already running more calculations and theories while John sipped at his soda.

"The only people who knew we went through the time portal are ourselves and John Henry." John could see Cameron's head pop up from her meditation and decided to cut her off again, "but I still don't think he would go _that_ far with us only to betray us when everything was already said-and-done."

"You're right," Cameron said, setting her empty plate of tofu down on the table and getting up from her seat. She cast one last look out at the motel room across the street before walking behind John's chair.

"That is the plan, we should stick to it," Cameron leaned down over John's face and gave him a kiss. It had taken him by surprise and he hurriedly tried to swallow the remaining food in his mouth but suddenly he couldn't move at all.

He felt a slight but firm pinch on the back of his neck and John knew what was going on. From all the take-down maneuvers his mother and all her dead-beat lovers had taught him, he knew what that pressure point did. Give a slight pinch or adjustment from a chiropractor and the victim is rendered unable to move until the nerve is hit again.

John wanted to get up from the chair and scream into her face. He knew exactly what she was going to do and the only thing he wanted to do right now was try and get her to stop. He watched as she pulled her face away from his and walked back around in front of him.

"I'm sorry, John," she said quietly, suppressing a human sigh.

Cameron took a seat besides John and picked up the phone near the table. He couldn't make out what number she was calling but resigned himself to waiting for what she was going to say.

"Yes, Holiday Inn? Could I be connected to room 479, please?" Cameron spoke with the perfect calm voice, a uncanny poker face as her fingers came to a rest on top of John's hand which lay in his lap.

"Sarah? 2014" a pause in her voice made John strain his ears to hear what his mother was saying on the other end of the phone, "Sarah, John is in room 238 across the street. Third floor. It's time."

Cameron quickly put the phone back on its hilt and stood up in front of John again. She kept her hand in touch with his until she knelt down in front of him. Her hands reached up and cupped his face.

"Mmmph..." was the only sounds that he could manage to utter. He wanted to move so bad that it felt like his eyes were going to pop out of his head but he knew that he wasn't going anywhere.

A single tear rolled down Cameron's cheek as she leaned in close and whispered in his ear, "Until next time, I love you." A few moments later she had crossed the room and exited, closing the door behind her.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

* * *

**Six months later**

* * *

**March 7, 1986**

**Ramada Inn Room: 87**

**Washington, Utah**

**2:47 AM**

* * *

John let the fork slip from his fingers again, causing it to fall and resound with a metallic _'ting'_ throughout the room. The room was empty and had remained so ever since dinner had been eaten about six hours before. He still continued to be planted in his seat with a full plate of cold food sitting idly in front of him. Kyle and his mother had left him a few hours ago, not bothering him as they did. They knew that something was up with him, even though John refused to let them know what it was.

His eyes roamed the chilled meal on the plate sitting on the otherwise empty table as he picked up the fork again. The cool metal of the utensil began to zap the heat from his fingers as he lifted it above his meal again. John picked a new target on the plate and released his projectile, watching it spiral as it fell. Only a moment later the tines on the fork made contact with the small mound of peas, skewering a few of them and sending the rest sprawling around his plate.

_I'm running out of things to impale, _John told himself grudgingly as he picked up the fork again, analyzing the peas that clung to the tines. After a moment of turning the fork over in his hand to examine the peas he let out a sigh and finally ate the first bit of food that had been prepared long ago. John let the cold mash of the vegetables sit in his mouth for a moment while reaching for his glass of water. He let the water was the mush of the peas down as his stomach groaned in reply to the food it received. It had been the first thing he had eaten all day and already he felt as if he were on the verge of vomiting.

A squawk from the electronic device in front of his plate finally drew his mind away from finding new ways to kill his meal. "_All units able to respond we have reports of a 510 in progress on Far Hills Ave. Witnesses report two vehicles traveling at high speeds through oncoming traffic..." _John drowned out the last of the dispatch message as it repeated itself. He had just settled into letting his mind wander when he heard an updated message, _"All units be advised, possible 10-80 involving the speeding vehicles. Chase has passed from Far Hills Ave to Vista...All units be advised, suspects are considered armed and dangerous."_

The codes were flying across John's eyes as he listened to the message again. Training from when he was a kid and spending endless amounts of time trying to memorize them had all but engrained them in his memory. 510 was easy, that was nothing more then a vehicle speeding or racing. John was trying to remember the 10-80 when it hit him like a bag of bricks square in the chest. He could still hear the police scanner from the SWAT van that his mother and Uncle Bob had fled the Cyberdyne building in loud in his head, _"All units be advised, reports of a 10-80 at the Cyberdyne building..."_

_"10-80 is explosion,"_ John thought, dropping his fork again and grabbing his jacket from the chair as he sped towards the door. "Six months, and you still haven't left the area. What were you thinking, Cam?" John slammed the door behind him and ran over to his car parked in the parking lot of their motel.

His car roared in response to the slamming of his foot to the pedal and he took off down the road towards their general direction. The journey was quiet in the car cabin with nothing but the sound of John's labored breathing and the roar of the engine to keep him company. At the moment he was trying to push everything to the back of his mind and get everything cleared for whatever he was going to see. Emotions made you react impulsively after all, something that he had been drilling into his mind ever since that day in the motel.

At the intersection up ahead he saw two squad cars blast through the red light with their sirens wailing as they sped down the road after their target. He slowed his car to within a reasonable speed for a sharp turn and swerved to the left and followed pursuit of them. They were already three blocks ahead of him but he could see the vehicles up ahead of them that they were chasing.

A blue Jeep and a gray Ford pickup were plowing their way through oncoming traffic with the ease that would allude even the most skilled human driver. Each move they made was precise, almost elegant, keeping straight lines to each directive until a turn or swerve was needed. No over-correction was needed when they slung their vehicles to-and-fro to avoid the oncoming traffic as well as the pursuing police cruisers behind them.

_"This is it,"_ John said to himself as he started speeding towards the chase up ahead. He silently gave himself a nod of approval for making modifications to the engine in his car, adding more power to the already powerful motor. They were allowing him to catchup to the police cars at such a pace that even made John raise an eyebrow.

He swallowed a breath of air as he tore in-between the squad cars and ignored the sirens which were now blaring in his rear-view. The two vehicles ahead of him were now alert to his presence and reacted in a similar manner, each moving in a defensive position on the street to keep him from passing them.

Each car that blasted their way past his side made John grip the steering wheel even tighter as he tried to keep up with the cyborgs reaction times as they continued swerving with an inhuman ease through the traffic. The front vehicle, the blue Jeep, was making a conscious effort in John's view to get as close to the other lane of traffic as possible. Two lanes lay between the Jeep and the now empty other side of the road, giving him an easier chance to stay with them and not collide with an oncoming car.

_"Nice move, Cam," _John smirked as he broke the tail on the gray pickup and smacked into the barrier that separated the differentiating lanes of traffic. It took only a moment for his vehicle to recover the momentum and come up alongside Stark's Ford.

John glanced over at the cyborg and saw him return his glare. In less time that it took John to stomp the gas pedal to the floor, Stark was already plowing his vehicle through the two lanes of traffic. A large Cadillac was broadsided and fishtailed across the barrier narrowly missing John as he sped past the car.

A small flash of orange light caught John's eyes as he continued speeding towards the side of the blue Jeep. No sooner had he pulled alongside the Jeep and caught view of Cameron did his car surge forward from an explosion behind him. John looked up after the recoil of the blast went away to see the pickup truck leaning to its right-side terribly, shooting sparks as it swerved across the road while gradually loosing its speed.

John breathed a sigh of relief until he noticed the police sirens in the background again. The distant squad cars had just flew past the wrecked pickup truck, one of them pulled over while the other continued its pursuit of them. His eyes were still watching the car try to catch up with him and Cameron when her car slammed into driver-side door.

The two cars separated on the road again only to slam into each other after a few moments apart, shattering his window and sending shards of glass flying inside the compartment. John flinched and squinted his eyes as the glass flew around his face and fell in the seat around him. He looked back over at the Jeep to see Cameron crouched like a panther ready to pounce on her target as she maneuvered the vehicle towards his car again with her left hand.

As their vehicles collided again he watched as Cameron leaped with inhuman accuracy from her drivers seat, through John's open driver-side window and crashed into the door frame of the passenger door. His car surged to the right from the impact of the crash and her body slamming into the door and he corrected accordingly.

"Keep driving," Cameron said, shifting herself into an upright position and instantly looking out the rear window as her Jeep drifted further and further behind them.

John was about to speak when a second explosion made him grip the steering wheel tighter and keep his eyes glued to the empty road out in front of them. A block up the road he finally felt tempted to look in his side mirror to see Cameron's Jeep turned upside down on the road and roaring with flames.

"Contingency plan?" John smirked finally, catching a glimpse of Cameron as she watched the second police cruiser come to a halt at the wreck of her Jeep.

"Something like that," She turned in her seat, ignoring him visually and started to unravel what appeared to be a bandage on her hand.

"What would you call that?" John asked apprehensively, returning his eyes to the road in front of him.

Cameron continued unwrapping her bandage and held up a cyborg computer chip from a T-800 unit. She turned it over multiple times, inspecting the integrity of the cores and structure of the chip itself.

"Find what you were looking for I take it?" John eyed the chip in her hand from his peripheral vision.

"Actually, something I wasn't expecting," her voice was flat, but John could tell that it was not from anger towards him. Something else was bothering her here.

"How'd you get that?" John asked, looking at the chip fully for the first time.

"Later, right now we need to ditch this car," Cameron said, closing her slim fingers around the chip and depositing it in her jacket pocket.

"Any suggestions?" chuckled John as he turned to his right and slowed the car down to reasonable traffic speed.

"Pull over here," Cameron motioned towards an empty parking space along her side of the road.

John followed her direction and stopped the car but his damaged door refused to budge as he hefted his weight against it. After the third try he sighed and slid across the seat to exit via the passenger door.

"Is there anything in the car you need to keep?" she asked, finally tucking her hair behind her ear and looking him in the eyes.

"I think everything I need is out of there," John replied.

He watched a wry smile form on her lips as she pulled something from the waistband of her pants. A long cylindrical container with a wire coming out of one end and a small rectangular lighter from her jeans pocket.

"Do you really have to?" John half-whined, casting a lonesome look over the car.

"We all pay our price, John," Cameron smirked and threw the tube of plastique into the drivers seat, shutting the passenger door behind her. "There is about thirty seconds on the fuse," She motioned towards an alleyway a few feet up ahead on the sidewalk.

"I really liked that car you know," He continued to whine as they set off towards the alley. They rounded the corner and started walking down the dark space in-between the buildings as the explosion went off shaking the ground as they continued their way towards the street out in front of them.

"You hungry?" Cameron asked, looking up at him as they crossed the street after the cars halted due to the explosion one block over.

"Starving actually," John chuckled as the walked to the left and towards a Burger King a few blocks down the road.

* * *

John walked towards Cameron with their tray of food and drinks. He sat the tray down on the table and slid into the booth opposite her and watched as she took out her salad, covering it in peanuts from a bag in her pocket. He eyed her suspiciously but disregarded it as she gave him a look of _you should know better._

He shrugged and took hold of his whopper but didn't eat. John watched her every movement carefully; from the way she was trying to be polite and avoid his gaze to the small movements she made to try and not be caught in an awkward situation. They were small things like constantly crossing and uncrossing her legs, to tapping with her left hand as her right hand stayed occupied with holding her fork.

"So," John said after her fourth mouthful of salad, "protein low?"

Her eyes moved up and looked at him momentarily as her right hand moved up to cover her mouth as she chewed. After swallowing she put down her fork and brushed her hair out of her face again before replying, "Yes."

"You always did burn through more protein then a bodybuilder," he chuckled and finally took a bite of his burger.

"So are we going to..." she quirked an eyebrow up towards him and waited for a sign from him before continuing.

After receiving a nod she extracted the chip from her jacket pocket and laid it on the table, "It took two months before I was able to even get a trace on him. He's very good at covering his tracks, much more so then other units I've come into contact with. Probably a by-product of spending years with operating with humans back in the 1920's."

"Anyways, I tracked him to an apartment complex; a pay by the hour place. Spent about a month just learning his routines..."

"Routines?" John said through a mouthful of his almost eaten burger.

"John, even _we_ have routines," Cameron smirked before continuing, "He left everyday before five am and met with multiple people; never the same person twice in a row and always two people each morning. Then after an hour or two of these meetings he would be tracking you until three or four am before returning to the apartment before starting again."

She took up her fork and began eating her salad again while John crunched up the empty wrapper from his burger. "So this guy was meeting with these people, did you follow them?"

"Sure did," Cameron replied after eating another bite, "They are all high school students."

"High school?" John sat back and crossed his arms in front of him, "The hell is he doing with high school kids?"

Cameron's left hand came up and tapped the chip sitting on the table. She continued eating the remainder of her salad while John took up the chip and started examining it.

It was smaller then Cameron's chip, more similar to what he had seen from the Uncle Bob unit years and years ago. The shock damping assembly was not connected to the chip in any way, letting him know that it was a pre-T888 chip. What was throwing John warning signs was the fact that he had never seen the design before, not even from his time spent in the Skynet manufacturing facility. Even though it was similar to the T-800 chips it was still different in its own way, like it was truly unique in-and-of itself.

"They made this?" John asked sounding impressed, and he was. Even with millions in backing from Cyberdyne it had taken Myles Dyson nearly eleven years to develop this technology. This Stark guy had managed to have teenagers construct one of these in less then...

"There were more, by the way," Cameron said, almost sensing his train of thoughts. "All destroyed by now, that is the only remaining one." She pointed towards the chip in John's fingers.

"More, so they weren't just making these in the past six months; they've been at this for quiet awhile now."

Cameron held out her hand for the chip and John gently laid it in her palm. She pointed towards the interface near the end of the chip, "They were connecting these to mainframes similar to a USB input but not entirely identical. I should be able to replicate it, but until then there is no way to know what is on that thing."

"What about the kids?" John said, taking his eyes off of the chip in her fingers and looking her in the eyes again.

"Until we know whats on the chip, I don't know if they are involved on any level other then constructing the chip. Still wouldn't hurt to keep an eye on them in the time being." She finished her salad and placed the empty container on the tray and set the chip down on the table again.

"Your hand looks better," John said, laying his right hand next to hers with his palm open. He watched as she placed her hand on top of his, tracing the lines on his palm with her fingertips.

"You look slimmer," she noted, ignoring the sensors which were giving her readouts of his vital signs from their touching hands. She had talked enough with Vasquez and others while they had been separated in the future to know how he had handled it before. And she still remembered his 'break' from reality.

"Stuff happens," John smirked, cracking a smile. "Speaking of which, whats with the Joan Jett look you have going on here?" He ran his eyes over her again. She was dressed in jeans, which were a normal staple with Cameron, but everything else made it look like she was trying to impersonate someone.

Her hair was dyed black, and straightened. It had been cut recently, barely even reaching her shoulders now. She had a gray t-shirt on underneath a leather jacket which looked like it had been left outside and ran over by hundreds of cars. Her skin was paler then he remembered, which made the makeup around her eyes and lips standout even more.

"I told you, hunting," Cameron cracked a smile and watched as John looked back at her. They remained their, staring at each other for minutes on end. "I was going to..."

"You don't have to," John cut her off, still rubbing his thumb over her hand. "In the past."

"In the past," Cameron reiterated.

They both stood from the booth and exited the restaurant together and started walking down the sidewalk in the direction of John's motel. For a few minutes they walked in silence, only their sneakers were sending out audible signals as they continued down the street.

"Where are you staying?" John asked after the first mile of zig-zagging their way through the streets in town.

"Nowhere," replied Cameron, crossing her arms at the cool air that whipped by as cars passed them. "I sleep when I can, mostly."

"You could," John started.

"I was under the impression I would be," Cameron said, bumping into his bicep with her shoulder. "I imagine Sarah and Kyle will be thrilled they aren't alone anymore."

John stopped in his tracks as Cameron continued walking a few steps ahead of him. _She knew? _How did she know that he had been paying for Claire to stay in a safe-house of her own for the past five months?

"Claire's fine, I check in on her daily," Cameron turned and smiled towards him, holding out her hand and nodding towards the road.

"You didn't mind that I?" John asked, taking her hand and taking up pace beside her again.

"I can see why you did," she replied. "And thanks for doing it."

"No..No problem," stuttered John, "So you're not?..."

Cameron turned to face him again, "No, I can't be mad at you for sending her away. She doesn't need to be around all this, and nor did Kyle or your mother."

"They check in all the time you know?" John said, sniveling from the cold air.

"I know," replied Cameron, squeezing his hand in turn. "I told you, I keep tabs on you guys. Speaking of which, how are you doing? They say that somethings going on with you, but they've chalked it up to...us."

"I handle things a little strangely for them I think. I'm fine," John reasserted giving her a smile and squeeze of the hand.

They crossed the parking lot and walked towards John's room. Dawn was beginning to make itself known to the world as they stopped outside his door. Cameron looked out at the town around them and chuckled.

"It is cold out here you know?"

"I know, I'm just glad to have you back," John said, slipping his key into the doorknob.

"I was always planning to come back."

* * *

This chapter pretty much wrote itself and hopefully so should the next few :D

To Be Continued...


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

* * *

**March 7, 1986**

**Ramada Inn Room: 87**

**Washington, Utah**

**5:59 AM**

* * *

Cameron got up slowly from the bed, letting the covers cling to her skin then fall as she walked away. The cool March air raised small bumps on her skin as she looked down and slipped on her socks and one of John's t-shirts. She turned and watched John as his chest rose and fell softly, lifting the thick covers with each breath. He seemed to be calm, which was a reassuring sight after watching him from afar for half-a-year.

With the prowess of a silent feline predator she made her way over to the customary table by the window in John's motel room. Her nimble fingers turned on the heating system situated below the window and listened as it hummed to life. Various statistics making note of the decibel level and compared it to the normal volumes of noise that would normally wake John. The wafts of air brought the aroma of his chilled meal still sitting on the table to her nose.

Equations, symbols, data statistics, and video feeds from her memories began bombarding her HUD. Only a split second passed before she had wiped the majority of them away, not wanting to deal with what information they were telling her at the moment. Cameron blinked and made a conscious effort to wipe the rest of them away when her eyes opened. She half-smiled as she picked up the plate and made her way towards the trash bin. Her ears were strained as she listened to John's breathing to prevent waking him as she scraped the uneaten food into the trash.

The socks kept her feet warm as she glided across the cheap linoleum floor of the motel. On her way to the bar located to the left of the sink Cameron noticed an empty pack of cigarettes on the counter-top. She took her place on one of the cool bar-stool seats and brought her hands up, cupping her chin as she watched John sleep. A smile formed on her lips as data started coming across her HUD again. Visual memories began replaying themselves from the multiple occasions that she had watched John sleeping. Patterns emerged and old patterns gave way to new ones as the memories started passing through her mind as she analyzed them. What made her smile was the confirmation of what she already knew, John's current sleeping pattern matched the established patterns that she knew reflected 'content' and 'peaceful' sleeping.

Her attuned ears picked up the subtle markers of the change in John's heart-beat and breathing, letting her know that he would soon be awake. Also on a smaller frequency, she could hear the small humming sound of an electrical device somewhere near her. Cameron turned her head to the right and saw the origin of the faint humming noise that had been present in the room, a small mini-fridge that was tucked neatly under the bar. She leaned down to observe it further and noticed that the motor on the inside of it was straining to cool the contents. An opening of the door revealed that nothing was salvageable for breakfast other then eggs and multiple unopened bottles of beer. She took the half-empty container of eggs and set to work at cooking up something for them to eat.

Dawn was still starting to brighten up the world outside as the familiar sizzle of a skillet stirred John from the bed. He sat up groggily and wiped the sleep from his eyes before stretching his arms outward in front of him. John cast a look over at Cameron and stretched again.

Cameron ran her eyes over his chest and back, noting the various scars that littered his skin. She moved her eyes from his navel where a small stab-wound lay then glanced upwards to his shoulders where burns were wrapping themselves from his pectorals to his collarbone. His muscles were tensing and relaxing as he tried to wake himself up further while standing up. Feigning needing to pay attention to the food, she averted her eyes to the stove as John pulled on his pants.

No sooner had his pants been zipped and buttoned then John instantly took off for the bathroom, slamming the door behind him. A few moments later and Cameron could hear the sounds of John dry-heaving emerging from the door. She frowned and slid one of the cooked eggs onto a plate before moving the skillet to an unlit burner and turning off the stove.

John's heaving continued as she walked up to the door and leaned against the wall outside, crossing her arms and looking down at the floor while she spoke, "You okay?"

"Fine..." John barely managed to say as he heaved up part of his meal from a few hours before. "I'll be alright."

"Let me know if you need anything," She said, before pushing herself off from the wall and walking back to the kitchen.

A few minutes passed as she started up the stove again and continued to cook the remainder of the eggs. John came out of the room slouching and stammering as he walked, "See, all better."

He took note of her cooking and the smell of eggs in the room, "You don't have to do this. I'm not that hungry," John said, walking up behind her and rubbing his left hand along Cameron's shoulder.

"You might not be hungry, but I still need to eat," She teased, nudging herself into his chest as he wrapped his arms around her belly.

"More protein?" John returned her playful tease by leaning over and planting a small kiss on the nape of her neck.

"Choline," Cameron corrected, "but protein is still in my daily requirements now."

"Daily? I thought you didn't need food everyday," John responded, looking a little bewildered.

"Consumption rates increase with productivity, just like your body," She raised an eyebrow as she slid the eggs onto a plate and offered it to him.

John waved his hand slightly to signal that he wasn't interested in the food at the moment, "All for you this morning, I'm not sure that orange juice and eggs are going to mix well with the taste of mouthwash and toothpaste. But thanks for offering."

"Suit yourself," she replied with a wry smile, taking up her seat on the stool and digging into the meal she had prepared.

"So I take it you've been very busy, needing all this food?" John said, taking his jacket from the nearby table and wrapping it around her shoulders.

"Mmmhmm," She mumbled as she chewed her food.

"I suppose running all over towns will do that to you. Especially if it is after a cyborg who is out to kill us and doom the world." John cocked his head to the side and looked at her.

"John you know why I left..."

John cut her off with a sympathetic but firm tone, "Oh I know, its exactly what I would have done. And I'm not asking for an explanation or apology. I'm just..." he caught himself with a lump in his throat.

Cameron continued to chew her food and watched his face closely, noticing every muscle movement and dash of his eyes to various parts of the room.

"I'm just happy you're back here," the words finally flew out of his mouth. "I would have thought we were past keeping secrets with each other."

Cameron was about to speak but found herself holding her tongue as John held up one of his hands in protest.

"Conspiring with my mother for over a month behind my back is a pretty damn big secret, Cam," scoffed John, rubbing his hand through his hair to move a few locks out of his face.

"Sarah and I talked. I had to let her know about me...about us. If she was ever going to stop being afraid and trust us at all, I had to do that," Cameron said, putting down her fork and turning in the seat to face him. "You remember how she was don't you? Paranoid, not sleeping, the hallucinations, constantly looking over her shoulder when it came to me," she fired off to him flatly.

For the moment Cameron had her fill of the conversation and turned in her chair, continuing eating her eggs as John watched while she finally spoke after swallowing another bite, "I didn't feel like letting her relive that, and I was thinking that you wouldn't either."

"I don't, but I do wish you would have told me about it," John eased the tension in his voice and relaxed his stance a little.

"In hindsight that might have been a good idea," her lips formed a smirk, causing John to chuckle.

"I should have told you," she gave him a half-smile. Cameron laid her left hand on his right thigh and gave him a reassuring pat. She watched as he rose from his chair and grabbed his jacket from the floor next to the bed. The cold-sweat was beginning to leave his brow and he had regained his stance as she noticed him walking back to her. John draped the jacket around her shoulders and took his seat on her left side again.

"Its a little chilly in here," John stated, retaking his seat after giving her the jacket to wear.

Cameron clutched at it and noticed that it was way too large and roomy for her lithe frame. Out of the corner of her eye a dotting matrix ran a calculation of the cloth size and compared it to John's body. Within three seconds the matrix concluded that the jacket was well above the size he should be wearing also. It piqued her interest, but she kept her poker face on as she turned to John and spoke.

"New clothes?" she asked, taking another bite of her eggs.

"Figured I needed to fit in," He said, brushing a lock of hair out of his face with a twist of his head.

"Does that include growing your hair back out and buying clothes large enough to stuff a shotgun into without anyone noticing?" Cameron set the fork down, already having finished eating her meal, and looked at him while propping her head up on her left hand.

"Told you, its all about fitting in," He replied with a slight hint of sarcasm.

"Mmm," Cameron pursed her lips and wrapped the jacket around herself more tightly. "Well, I need to wash all this stuff off," she motioned to her black nails and still lingering makeup from the night before, "can you take this?"

John nodded and picked up the plate for her while she walked towards his bathroom, gathering up her clothes as she neared the door. He watched until she disappeared in the doorway before getting up and placing the dish in the sink. The sounds of water coming from the bathroom door let him know that she at least couldn't hear him popping the top off of the beer he had taken from the mini-fridge.

He took a slow swig from the bottle while looking out at the small city from his window. _Who knew that thing was still in Vegas, recruiting teenagers to do its bidding? Then again it didn't have much incentive to leave the area, not after knowing its 'highest priority target' was in the vicinity. _John smirked as he took another gulp of beer, reminding himself that terminators rarely had ulterior motives other then what they were programmed to do. After the third hit from his beer the bottle was empty and he made sure to toss it away under the plate in the trash from last night.

John looked at Cameron's jacket laying in the chair across the room and made his way over to where it was hanging. His hands rummaged through the many pockets in the rough leather before finding the weird chip that she had shown him earlier. Gently picking it up, he turned it over and over again in his hands.

_If there is something on here I missed last night, its worth a shot at looking into, _ John told himself as his eyes scanned the chip through and through but yielded nothing. The chip continued to hide its secrets as Cameron walked out of the shower, still drying her hair with a towel.

"Odd, isn't it?" She said, taking a seat across from John at the table, crossing her legs as she did.

John gave her a nod as she continued, "Well I can say that it is not for operating anything on the scale of an infiltrator. The circuitry and design are far too inferior for that." She held out her hand openly for the chip and he placed it in her palm.

"See these here?" Her right index finger pointed towards the small circuits on the motherboard, "There would be many times the amount needed for programming and operating anything stored on the chip. It has to be a storage medium for Stark, or something along those lines."

"So he isn't manufacturing chips to program things with, then what the hell is he storing on the drives?" John cupped his chin in his right hand.

"No telling until I build something to analyze it with, which is going to be interesting," Cameron rolled her eyes and set the chip back down on the table in between them.

"How so?"

Cameron threw him a look of disbelief and motioned her hand around the room, "1986, John."

"Oh yea, time travel," He chuckled in reply, "Never thought there would be a time in my life where I would be happy to see a Starbucks and a bulky desktop computer."

"Are you okay?" asked Cameron, resting her hands on top of his on the table.

"Yea, just got this bug that is going around. Haven't been able to keep any food down in the past week. Over the counter meds have my head in a little bit of a loop," he replied.

"Do you need to lay back down?" Cameron asked, taking a quick reading of his vitals through her fingertips as he pulled his hand away.

"I'm fine, Cam," John said, running his hand through his hair again before resting both of them in his lap. "So you checked up on Claire?"

"Mmm," Cameron raised her head and looked him in the eyes, "She's getting by."

"Kyle and mom knew as well?" John tilted his head and cinched his brow.

"They didn't know what I was doing, only that I needed time before coming back. I asked them not to say anything to you..."

"I can handle myself," a lower tone came as he spoke, Cameron recognized it as his authoritative voice.

"I didn't want you to know where I was because I knew you would come running," Cameron leaned towards him in her chair, looking him squarely in the eyes, "What I was doing was physically dangerous, and would have been impossible for me to do if you or anyone else were to come along."

"I know, and I don't blame you for going in alone. Like I said, I wish you would have said something," His face relaxed and he eased himself into the back of the chair.

"How many per day are you going through?" Cameron asked, reaching across the table with her hand and just falling short from coming into contact with him. Her eyes flew to the trash bin where his empty beer bottle was.

John followed her gaze to the trash bin and sighed.

"You heard that, huh?" John frowned.

Cameron nodded, "I hear everything."

"Dunno, maybe five or six," He replied. "Its actually one of the few things I can eat or drink without puking it up right now."

"What time do you feel up to moving around?" asked Cameron, getting up and maneuvering around to sit on the corner to the bed to be closer to him.

"Give me an hour or so, I get a little queasy after I just wake up. Doesn't help that the whole place smells like eggs now," He chuckled and flashed her a smile. "So what did you guys talk about when you met up?"

"Claire? Or...?" Cameron leaned in and propped her elbows on her knees. Her chin came to a rest in her palms as she waited for John to respond.

"Mom."

"Not much, we actually talked about Kyle mostly," She said, "Though for the first couple of times we met, she did stay focused on asking about the war."

"What all did you tell her?" John rushes his words, his mind already thinking up worse case scenarios of how his mother would react to even the slightest bit of bad news.

"What little of the truth that wouldn't send her off the deep-end again," she said sympathetically.

"Thank you," He said, taking slow breaths of air as he spoke.

Cameron moved her legs to the side to allow him room to get by as she heard the gurgling sounds coming from John's abdomen. He was up in a flash and running towards the bathroom as the sounds of a knock came from the front door. "That would be Sarah and Kyle."

Cameron rose from her seat and opened it for the two waiting faces outside. "Hey," she greeted them, getting a response of surprise from both of them.

"Oh," Kyle said, sounding surprised at the sight of her. "Cameron?"

"Hello," She replied, watching Kyle as he covertly ran his eyes over her. She supposed he was taking in what John called her 'Joan Jett' look.

"So, you're back?" Sarah asked. Her eyes greeted Cameron warmly before they roamed over her shoulder and searched the room for John. "Is he here?"

"I'm back, but I don't think now is a good time," no sooner had Cameron spoke then the sounds of John heaving rushed from the bathroom door a few feet behind her.

"Did you guys patch things up?" Sarah asked suddenly.

Cameron leaned against the door-jam and hid her smile from their view, "He ran into me last night and we're working on it."

"Is he feeling any better?" Kyle took a step forward and looked into Cameron's eyes sternly. "Is he still?"

"So far," replied Cameron, brushing the hair from her face.

"Any news with the metal?" Kyle shifted his weight as he spoke.

Sarah walked a few paces forward and placed her hand on Kyle's shoulder, "Kyle, we shouldn't be..."

"We're actually about to go and work on it when John is feeling up to it," the sound of John's final heave made Cameron prop herself up from the door-jam and step back into the motel room.

"Let us know when you need us," Kyle replied as his brow tightened, "We'll be ready."

Sarah nodded as well while both of them turned and made their way back to the sidewalk. Cameron watched them walk away and tried to ignore the sounds of John coming towards her from behind. They turned south and started heading towards a parked car about a block down the road. She took note of the vehicle make, license plate number, and color as she shut the door.

As John exited the bathroom while brushing his teeth again, Cameron laid back down on the bed and smiled up towards him, "Sarah and Kyle were checking in."

"Yea," John said in-between brushes, "They usually stop by every couple of days."

He returned to the bathroom and spat out the contents of his mouth, gargling water, and spitting it out as well. "So what were you wanting to do today?" John asked as he came out of the bathroom and lay next to her on the bed.

"If you feel up to it," she said, "I think we need to go shopping."

John snorted, "For what?"

"Computer parts, John," she threw him a teasing look and gently hit him in the head with her pillow.

"Well you can't exactly walk into a Price Club and buy a computer, what did you have in mind?" He turned onto his back and looked up at the ceiling as Cameron laid her arm on his chest, tracing the pattern of one of his scars with her nimble fingers.

"Like I said, it depends on if you feel up to it," she grinned, retracing the scar again.

"Let me get my meds," he sat up on the bed and looked over his shoulder towards her, "then we can get out of here."

"Well before we do anything we're going to need a space big enough to situate all this stuff," Cameron said as he walked into the bathroom, "Someplace more...permanent." She rolled her eyes over the stark motel room.

"Whats wrong with this place," John asked sarcastically, wiping the few remaining beads of sweat from his forehead.

"John, we need a bigger place," Cameron stated, letting her voice fall flat.

"Cam, it isn't like we are building a super-computer. It's a desktop, the most space its going to take up is maybe the size of a coffee table," He laughed as he pulled on a shirt and then his jacket.

Cameron sat up on the bed and grabbed him gently by the arm, "No secrets, John."

He stopped moving and sat down beside her, "How did you find out?"

She held up one of her hands for him to see and gave a half-hearted smile before it turned into a frown, "I see everything. I _hear_ everything. Even though you think I might not. Even when sometimes...I don't want to."

"I sometimes forget that," He replied with a soft tone, taking her right hand in his and giving it a squeeze.

"We're going to need the extra space," Her eyes locked onto his as she leaned in closer to him.

"For all the equipment..." John let his voice trail off as Cameron nodded and closed the gap between them, their lips touching for a soft kiss.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15**

* * *

**March 7, 1986**

**Veteran's Memorial Highway**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**10:17AM**

* * *

John was sleeping peacefully in the passengers seat of Cameron's car. He never was one to sit still for very long and had finally fallen asleep after watching the landscape roll by outside of his window. The heated air blew over him from the vent on the dash, warming his body and helping him settle more deeply into his snoozing paradise.

Cameron's car was starkly decorated to the blind eye but further investigation would reveal various nooks and crannies full of documents and weapons. In the backseat were newspapers stacked neatly on top of the floor-mat, an extra blanket folded and sitting on the backseat, and a tropical air freshener hanging from the rear-view mirror; modified Glocks were sewn into the backs of the front seats while a combat shotgun lay underneath the rear-seat cushion. Various scribbles and articles were encircled on the newspapers highlighting a plethora of leads that she had found related to Stark in the past six months.

Cameron continued on down the highway as they reached the outskirts of Cedar City, a relatively small town of about two-or-three-thousand populous. Her eyes scanned the buildings and overlaid them with an aerial view that she had studied in 2009. Not to her surprise, she found that the core of the town remained the same but much of it had changed from the 1980's to 2009. When she had previously spent hours studying maps of the world, the city was about three times the size that it currently was with various shopping locations and residencies available. What lay before her now was a quaint town that was just on the cusp of an economic expansion.

As the car rolled past the city limits sign Cameron pushed the street maps in her display aside as she slowed the car down for the red light up ahead. John stirred in the seat next to her and she relaxed herself more into her own seat as he sat up and looked groggily out of the windshield.

"We there?" his voice sounded hoarse and resounded in a lower register then normal as he spoke.

"Almost," Cameron replied, resting her right hand on his left thigh. "You can probably get some more sleep before we arrive."

"Nah, I've slept enough today," John smirked as he wiped his eyes and blinked rapidly at the bright sun.

The light turned green and Cameron responded with turning left and following the procession of light traffic down the road. She continued driving through the next intersection as John watched her from his seat.

"So you see everything huh?" his eyebrows rose as he spoke.

"I have the ability to," she replied, "most of the time I'm deciding what I do and do not want to see."

John looked down at her hand resting in his lap curiously and shrugged, "Like what, for example?"

"Right now, the road," no sooner had she spoken the words to him then she knew what he was asking for. Her current HUD had little to no data flowing across it at all, everything was wiped clean from and running in the background as she watched the world in full color through her eyes.

"I wouldn't know how to say it without freezing time, there would be too much to try and explain," Cameron continued, taking notice of John now holding her hand in his.

"I'll try and keep up," He chuckled, and waited for her to continue.

"Well," she said with a sigh, "There are three cars in front of us. I'm running diagnostics on them; estimations of weight, ability to perform certain maneuvers, that goes the same for the few cars in the oncoming lanes of traffic to the left as well as the unknown variable of the drivers that are behind the wheels of each vehicle. Right now we're surrounded by relatively low height buildings which are spread out, letting me know that the surface area for running or chasing is quite large and will be noticeable to nearly anyone within view of the road..."

"About 15,000 feet above us is a commercial airliner heading in a descending pattern towards the Cedar City airport about a mile to the north-east of here. That gives me options of knowing that at least one functioning airliner is present and a possible asset if need be. On top of that I'm keeping track of the weather outside, and the conditions that seem to be currently changing in barometric pressure. Then there is you..."

She turned and gave him a small smile, "I can hear your breathing patterns and heart-beating. Both are in normal range given the amount of time I've been around you..."

"Okay, so you do all that?" John asked, wrapping his head around thinking about all of what she had just described.

"I can choose not to," she replied, "I mostly just focus on my immediate surroundings."

"But when you do pay attention to all of that," he said, "How do you keep up with it all?"

"I'm not sure. I don't know how to describe it. Its just something I've always done. Asking me to describe that would be like me asking you why you perform those idiosyncrasies that make you, you."

"So do you do all that stuff separately or all at once?

"It depends," replied Cameron, "Calculating and analyzing too many things at once will tax my systems, so I normally break things up and switch between them while observing."

"Ah..." John spoke understandingly. "So all of that," he motioned outside to the things she had described, "is broken up into what? The city, then the plane, then the cars?"

"No, I can handle observing all of that at once quite easily," quipped Cameron with a smirk.

"Whoa," mouthed John. "Had no idea you were that advanced."

"I don't know if I'm advanced at all. I just know that I've always been capable of doing it," she replied as the car slowed for the next red light.

"So all if that gets measured over the course of a couple seconds, or constantly all at once?...When you're wanting to observe that is..." John broke eye contact with her momentarily to look out at a local diner across the street.

Cameron followed his gaze to the diner and turned back to him. "Are you hungry?" Cameron asked.

"Starving," He said in reply as his stomach growled. His hands flew to his pockets and started ruffling through them, "Think I have some cash here somewhere."

"I have cash, John." Cameron extracted a thick wad of bills wrapped in a rubber band, "Don't worry about it, there is plenty to go around."

"Do I want to know where all this came from?" John smirked and looked over at her.

Cameron looked at him from the corner of her eye as the light turned green, "No." A smile formed on her lips as she turned in the turning lane towards the diner and parked in an empty space. She turned the car off and looked over at John, giving his hand a slight squeeze as he sat up in the seat and gave her a grin of his own.

"I'll only be a minute, shouldn't take too long if I order to go," his free hand reached for the door latch before a tug from Cameron stopped him.

"John, we have time to sit down and eat," She quipped, "You don't have to be in a constant rush every minute you know."

"You sure?" He asked, setting one foot out of the door but not moving further to remove himself from the car.

"It's going to take us all day just to find a place to set up everything. We have plenty of time," Cameron dropped her hand from his grip and got of the car.

John exited the car and stood beside her in front of the front bumper as they waited for a exiting car to pass them before entering the diner. They walked towards the door side by side until John stepped forward and opened it for the waiting Cameron. She stepped inside and John followed, the noise from the patrons inside hitting their ears loudly as they stepped across the threshold. Cameron looked for an open booth and found an ideal option available near the rear of the establishment located near the fire exit. John chuckled to himself when he noticed her tactical choice of seating as he followed her to the booth and took a seat opposite of her.

His fingers floated over to the dated menu that lay on the table next to the window. It was, from the looks of it, and older place to eat, probably operating since the sixties or earlier. The menu reflected this in John's eyes as he scanned for something that sounded remotely appetizing. His brow furrowed and cinched as he poured over the contents of the menu while Cameron watched him with intrigue.

Her eyes studied him as he flipped back and forth across the pages of the menu. She slid the one in front of her to the side and cast a glance out over the other occupants of the diner. The dull roar that had hit their ears was coming from 32 other persons in the establishment, each of them talking amongst each other and over the clanging of dishes. Cameron reached across the table and rested her hand on John's.

A server came walked towards their booth while making her rounds and smiled down at them.

"Hi, I'm Wendy. I'll be your server today," the girl beamed, "Can I start you guys off with some drinks?"

John looked up at the girl and politely responded with his order of a coffee. Cameron never looked away from John as she called out her order, a glass of water.

"Great, do you guys still need a few minutes to decide on what you'd like to eat?"The girl shifted her weight onto her right leg and turned her body to face John.

John couldn't help himself as his eyes floated over all of the obvious places on her body that could conceal a weapon as she spoke to him. "Yes, please," he responded. His eyes flew back to the menu as the girl resumed her normal stance and walked away while thanking them for their order.

Cameron continued to watch him, fascinated at every movement his face was making. To her, everything he was doing at the moment was telling her so many things that she just wanted to remain seated there for the remainder of the day. She knew most of his tells and the signs that his face gave away, even though he had trained himself to hide what he was thinking. They were things only she or another machine could notice. Small changes in muscle tension, a two-percent dilation of his pupils, a twitch in his left eyebrow from nerve damage of the scars on his face; they all told her things.

The waitress began making her way back to their table with their drinks. She placed the glasses down in front of them and took out her pad and pen again, "Have you guys decided?"

Cameron took notice of the girl asking John first, and also how her body was once again facing him instead of the neutral position of both of them.

"Cam?" John asked, breaking her out of the daze that clouded her mind.

"I'm sorry, yes?" replied Cameron, shuffling her weight in the seat and smiling over towards him.

"You first, I'm still making up my mind on all this...stuff," he winked at her and buried his face in the menu again.

Cameron looked up at the server who had turned from John and was now staring at her with open eyes, waiting to take her order. She folded the menu up and handed it to the young girl who took it unexpectedly, "I'll have the pancakes."

John cast her a quizzical look as he chuckled to himself before he looked up and ordered a hamburger. The girl collected his menu and walked away with their orders as the two sipped lightly on their drinks.

"Pancakes, huh?" He quirked, "Egg's weren't enough?"

"I'm not hungry," Cameron whispered.

He mouthed an 'ah' and propped his arms on the table. At the moment he was trying to stay awake, hoping quickly that the caffeine from the coffee would kick in and give him a jolt. His eyes were burning and aching to be wiped but he didn't make a gesture to ease the sting emanating from them. John gritted his teeth and looked out the window, hoping to find something interesting to look at while his coffee worked its magic.

"We could talk about it," Cameron stated, resting her eyes on the side of his face. "We will have to eventually..."

"What is there to say?" he asked, still letting the absolute nothing of the outside world capture his attention.

"John," she reached across the table and took hold of his forearm, "its nothing big to worry about, especially if we take care of it right now."

"Where," he gave a false-laugh and finally locked eyes with her. "Its not like we can just barge into a hospital. Our identities are blown from that house-fire."

"We could try and do it at the new place," she gave his arm a pat before retracting her hand as the waitress neared the table with their food.

The woman set Cameron's plate down slightly harder then was called for and nimbly placed John's in front of him. She asked them the menial questions of 'can I get you anything else' before leaving them alone again, an act which brought a slight smile to Cameron's face. John took note of it when he picked up his first french fry and popped it into his mouth.

"So you have what? Detailed files on human anatomy?" he chewed the fry and swallowed it while waiting for a response.

"I'm fully capable, John," Cameron said confidently as she picked at the food sitting in front of her.

"How could you do it though? Its not like we have everything that would be needed," he replied, finally picking up his burger and taking the first bite.

"I can gather the tools and equipment within a day, if you wanted me to," she gave him a wink as she stabbed the pancakes again.

"Actually I was more focused on the anesthetic and extra blood more then the _tools_," he gave a halfhearted laugh and cast a worried look across the table at her.

"I can get the anesthetic, but the blood would be a problem," Cameron reached across and took hold of his free hand again.

"Increased awareness of security regarding transfusions in this _time_, John," her eyes widened, hoping that he got her message. She relaxed a little when his face told her that he understood.

"Well if you think you can do it, give it a try," he smiled but it didn't reach his eyes as he took another fry and popped it in his mouth.

A man seated in the booth behind Cameron stood up and made his way towards the front door. As he walked past their table, Cameron reached out and took hold of the newspaper tucked under the mans arm. The man continued walking as the paper left his grasp and stayed glued in midair to her hand, making both John and herself chuckle.

"So am I to assume that pickpocketing is part of the whole 'edgy grunge' look you have going on here?" John smirked and took a bite of his burger.

"I've always been a pickpocket," she teased and looked down at the newspaper, scanning the rows of text on the first page.

"Like hell you have," John scoffed, taking another sip of his drink.

Cameron formed a wry smile on her lips and looked up at him through her short bangs. A flick of her head brushed them aside as she leaned in closer to him, "Yes, I have."

"How so?" John mimicked her by leaning in and lowering his voice with a smile of his own.

"The first time you met me, I had clothes. How do you think I got the money? I also had an iPod," she tilted her head to the side and gave him an _I-told-you-so_ expression.

"Ah," John said, leaning back into the booth seat as he twirled a fry between his thumb and index finger, "So whats with the newspaper?"

Cameron turned the paper over in her arms and edged it towards John, her finger pointing to a specific section of the last page.

For Sale or Rent

"Oh," he said through the burger taking up residency in his mouth.

Cameron impaled the pancakes on her plate as her eyes shifted through the text on the page in front her.

1 Bedroom / 1 Bath apartment for rent..

2 Bedroom / 1 Bath home for sale. 900 .

Her eyes continued to scan the listings until she came across the last one in the column.

3br / 2 bt | 1,100 . Duplex apartment for rent. $600 per month. Fully furnished.

Please call: 435-555-0969 for more info

"What do you think of this?" she turned the paper around for him to read and pointed to the bottom listing, "Its the only one with the space big enough to setup a tech lab."

"Uh duplex, Cam," he said hesitantly, "We'd be keeping the people across from us up all night with noise and stuff. Not to mention if Stark ever comes knocking, they'd be in harms way."

"We could keep looking," her eyes fell down to the paper again, "but right now its the only thing we have to go with. We might as well check it out."

The waitress was making her rounds again and approaching their table, her footsteps were audible even over the dull roar inside the diner. Her face softened and brightened noticeably as she reached their table and eyed John sitting there calmly while eating his meal.

"Excuse me, miss," Cameron said abruptly, cutting the girl off before she even opened her mouth. "I don't suppose you have a phone here do you?"

"Err..yes, ma'am" the girl snapped from her daze and pointed towards the rear of the diner counter, "ask for Mr. Will, he's the big burly guy behind the counter over there, and he should have no problem with letting you use it."

Cameron smiled to her a thank-you and rose from her seat, noticing John's look of _please don't leave me alone with her_ expression as she turned and made her way towards Mr. Will.

"Sir?" the waitress repeated to John, still waiting patiently beside his table. "Everything okay with your meal?"

"Yea, yes ma'am," John corrected himself and gave her a halfhearted smile. "Excellent."

"Good, good," she responded, "Well, let me know if you need anything else."

The girl turned and began to walk to the next booth before stopping herself and spinning around on her heels again, "I'm sorry, but I think I know you from somewhere."

John's food hung in his throat as he swallowed and he reached out for his drink, letting the beverage wash down the thick load of burger. His voice was raw from the burning sensation left from the fizz as he looked up at the girl with his right eye. "Ah? That's weird...we're just passing through town."

"That is weird...I just have this weird feeling, like deja-vu." The girl eyed him a little suspiciously as he kept the left side of his face along with his scars from her full view.

Like a predator, Cameron came to a halt behind the girl without any audible tell at all. Even John wouldn't know she had been standing there if he weren't already watching her walk towards their table again. The waitress turned to leave and shrieked at the sight of Cameron standing there like a statue behind her. The entire diner turned and gave the table a quick look-over while the waitress patted her chest to calm her now thumping heartbeat.

"It's okay folks," she expressed to them loudly as Cameron took her seat.

The waitress turned and made her way to the booth behind theirs as Cameron eyed John worriedly. "Is everything okay?"

"She said she was having deja-vu, and felt like she knew me," John said through his clenched jaw.

Cameron's hands were already in her jacket pocket extracting a twenty dollar bill for their meal when she gave John a nod to stand. As if he were a machine that were perfectly in time with her movements, John and Cameron both rose in unison from their table. She laid the twenty down on the edge of the table and started following John towards the front door.

"Hey, you guys," the girl called from behind them.

Cameron turned to see her eying the twenty dollar bill wildly, "Keep the change."

"Thu...thanks! You guys come again!" she said with enthusiasm.

Both of them exited the diner and power-walked towards Cameron's car. John snatched the handle and sat down in his seat harshly while Cameron calmly sat down and started the car with her keys.

"Seat belt," she said, putting the car into drive but not pulling out of the parking lot.

"You gotta be shitting me," he threw her a incredulous look but reached towards the seat belt anyway.

"Nah, I would never be shitting you," she chuckled and released the brake, letting the car coast out of the parking lot and onto the road in front of them.

* * *

"This the place?" John asked, looking out with an open jaw at the duplex in front of them.

He had to hand it to Cameron, it certainly was big enough for everything that they would need to setup a technology lab. More then big enough, actually. Though the exterior design made him want to give her the most massive eye-roll in the history of mankind.

"Looks like it," she said, not giving in to the skepticism in his voice.

"Cam, its...pink," John looked out at the building again, noting the pink painted planks that covered the exterior of the house with the white trim.

"We can always repaint it, John," she half-laughed as she stepped out of the car and waved at the woman standing in front of the door.

John grudgingly exited the car and walked hand in hand with her up the small walkway to the front door. The woman waiting for them was dressed like a realtor that was trying just a bit too hard to come off as successful. Her suit was nice, though worn and the way she greeted them made him think she was very anxious at getting the property off her hands. He cast another look at the god-awful pink exterior of the house and thought to himself, _I can certainly see why, too._

"Hi, I'm Melissa Coleridge," The woman extended an eager hand out to them both and greeted them with a brilliant white smile.

"Pleased to meet you. I'm Cameron, this is John," Cameron spoke, letting the already off-put John stay inside his shell.

"Would you guys like to come inside?" Melissa planted the key inside the door-lock and turned it, opening the door for them.

"Sure," Cameron smiled in return and pulled John into the house.

_Shoot me now, _he thought.

They stepped inside to a large room filled with various rustic wear that John never would have guessed it contained. It was large enough for a sofa, love-seat, two recliners, an entertainment center, and the walls were filled with various paintings of farms and livestock. To John it was like stepping inside of someones home who had recently moved from Texas, and they were desperately homesick.

"This is the living area," Melissa waved her hand around to show them everything, "As you can see the previous tenants kept everything nice and clean in here. The carpeting is actually brand new, they installed it themselves."

Cameron looked down and saw the bright white carpet the woman was referring to. Her eyes zoomed in to see the various dirt particles that were pushed down into the semi-plush fabric. _She obviously tried to make it look habitable to show people._

"They were from the south, so everything in here is kinda rustic," Melissa lead them over to the paintings on the wall and positioned one to look perfectly level, Cameron noted that her adjustment actually made everything worse.

She turned and started leading them towards the dining area while John came up and whispered in Cameron's ear, "I _hate_ cowboy stuff..."

"We can change it if it bothers you _that_ much," she whispered in reply while paying attention to Melissa describe the exquisite nature of the bland table sitting in front of them.

"Can we have a minute or two alone? If that's okay?" Cameron cut her off abruptly.

Melissa looked slightly offended, but nodded in approval as she opened her notebook and started scribbling things down.

Cameron lead John into the kitchen and feigned looking around, "John, this place will have to do for now."

"What makes you dead set on getting it? That is what has me curious," He sighed, trying to keep his voice at a low level to avoid any eavesdropping.

"It has enough room to fulfill our needs, both as place to stay, medical area, and technology lab." She walked up to him and took hold of his hand again, "If you really hate the pink that much, I'll repaint it before we do anything else."

She watched his eyes as they roved across her face. He looked like he was both confused and extremely uncomfortable in this place, and she knew why. John hated moving but what he hated even more then anything else was something that only Cameron was privy to. He absolutely hated settling into a new area. It meant not only creating a new identity for yourself, but research about the area, as well as the neighbors you lived next to. She knew that he didn't mind traveling from place to place, but she did know that he hated going to one place and settling down there for an unknown period of time.

John nodded in reply as Cameron peeped her head through the kitchen door to see Melissa, "Are there any tenants next door?"

"Actually no," Melissa beamed with a smile and made her way around the table to face them, "They moved out about a month ago. It isn't furnished at all and the electricity needs some work done before it will be ready for anyone. You guys would have all this to yourselves."

Cameron felt the squeeze of John's hand on hers and smiled to herself, "Would it be possible for use to rent _the entire_ building?"

"That would be...quite a leap in pricing per month, miss?" Melissa looked taken aback at Cameron's question.

"Grimm," replied Cameron, "Cameron Grimm."

"Ah, well Miss Grimm; like I said the electricity needs to be reworked in half the building over there before it would be useable..."

"My fiancee, John, is actually an electrician. Maybe we could work out some kind of deal for him to fix it?" Cameron cut her off politely.

She could see the gears turning in Melissa's mind as she thought of everything. To Cameron it looked like she was trying to find an excuse not to lease the building to them, but in the end she must have come up dry. "I suppose that would be okay," she cast a weary look at John before smiling at Cameron.

"Do you take cash payments? We're both in kind of a bind on our credit, with the upcoming wedding and all," Cameron pretended to lean into John and rest her head lovingly on his shoulders while she spoke.

"I suppose that would be..okay, but like I said; the payments are going to be larger per month for the whole building," Melissa said. "I...do you really think you need all this room? For just and electrician and...I'm sorry what is it you do Miss Grimm?"

"I make clothes to sell," she responded almost instantly to Melissa's question, "some girls at work are asking for custom this and custom that, so I offered to help them out."

"Right," Melissa once again turned the information over in her brain and came up empty with a reason not to rent to them,"well I suppose if you can afford it then the place is yours."

"How much do you need for a deposit?" Cameron asked, standing upright and delving her hand into her jacket pocket to retrieve the wad of bills she had.

"Th...Umm" Melissa's eyes bulged at the sight of the cash in Cameron's hand and she cleared her throat, "five-hundred now, one-thousand per month?"

Cameron extracted the amount she had asked for and kindly offered it to her. She watched as Melissa accepted it but still kept her eyes glued on the large roll of money that Cameron put back into her jacket. The woman re-counted everything to make sure the amount was correct before handing them the paperwork to sign for the lease.

John took the folder and sat on the couch in the living room while looking over everything. Cameron came and sat next to him as Melissa waited patiently for them by the door.

"I can get this," Cameron whispered, as she took the notebook from his hands and the pen as well.

Her eyes scanned the page and made a photo-copy for her memory banks. She selected a visual overlay to display itself on her HUD as she traced it onto the paper, forging her signature. Upon selection of a new handwriting overlay, she forged John's in less then two seconds and stood up from the couch with a smile.

"Thanks for this," Cameron said as she handed the binder back to the eager Melissa.

"No, thank _you,_" Melissa responded in kind with a warm smile and handshake. "Here are the keys, and my number is here if you need me for anything." She deposited two sets of keys in John's hands while offering Cameron her business card.

"We'll make sure to call if we have any problems," Cameron said, waving at Melissa as she walked down the path to her car waiting at the side of the road.

"Thanks again, you two!" She got into her car and started down the road as Cameron turned on her heels and faced John again.

"That wasn't so bad was it," Cameron asked, settling into the mood that John associated her with, instead of the happy-fiancee.

"I uh...I need to lay down," John said, holding his hand across his stomach and pulling away from her grasp of his other arm.

"You and me both," Cameron said with a sigh. "I need to sleep for an hour or so before going out and stocking this place." Her nose crinkled at the smell in the living room, which reminded her of moth-balls.

"Well we never did get to see anything other then the living room and kitchen," said John with a yawn, "where are the bedrooms?"

"Probably upstairs," Cameron responded. She walked to the bottom of the staircase and waited for him to come over.

"Ah," he replied with a hint of sarcasm, "I see where this is going."

"What?" asked Cameron innocently. "You're stomach is upset and I need to rest for an hour or so, I'm running on pretty low reserves at the moment from the night before. I wasn't exactly doing nothing, you know," she laughed as they reached the top of the stairs and found three doors.

John walked over to the nearest door on the left and opened it. The hinges squeaked slightly until the door opened fully to a sparsely furnished bedroom with a deflated waterbed. Cameron walked up beside him in the doorway and peaked her head over his shoulder.

"Dibs," she said instantly, intrigued at the idea of sleeping on something she hadn't before.

"Great," John said with sarcasm, "while you fill that thing up, I'm going to go crash on the couch."

Cameron watched him walked back down the stairs before she turned and looked back at the water bed with interest. _This will be interesting,_ she thought as she stepped into the room and closed the door behind her.

* * *

To Be Continued...

More of a light-hearted chapter then the others :3


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

* * *

**March 9, 1986**

**Duplex Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**2:03 PM**

* * *

Cameron laid the last box of old things from the duplex into the empty second half of the building and shut the door behind her. If anyone would have called the previous tenants here very sparse people, their opinions would pale in comparison to what was filling up the space in the place now. The walls were practically bare due to John's insistence on removing any notion of what he called cowboy-ism and a few pieces of furniture were gone as well. Her eyes looked over the airy room and saw John snoozing on the couch with his feet hanging off the ends of the arm rest.

She felt like walking over and waking him up but her better judgment decided against it. His light snores were filling her ears as she walked into the kitchen and started taking out some of the supplies that were sitting on the counter. Cameron spent an hour taking everything out of the normal hiding places and rigging up weapons for easy access in case of a break-in. The trunk of her car rose considerably off of its axle after several duffel bags of weapons had been hauled inside and stashed away in the nooks and crannies of the house.

After her work, she made her way back into the living room from her bedroom upstairs to find an abandoned couch with no trace of John. Cameron instantly raised the intensity of her audio receptors but caught no sound or trace of him in the house. She began eliminating noises in the background until she picked up the sound of something being singed, and burning. Her face relaxed as she opened the front door to find John smoking on the porch. He was sitting on the banister with his legs hanging off the rails and his back propped against the wall of the house.

"Thought I could sneak one," John said, he removed the butt from his mouth and began to flick it before Cameron stopped him.

"You don't have to stop on my account," her hand lowered and she watched John take another drag from the cigarette.

"Well I didn't want to stink up the house, lets put it that way," he chuckled and smoke began to creep its way out of his mouth.

"Apology accepted," she leaned against the opposite banister and watched him silently for a few moments.

"So," John said after finishing the cigarette and flicking it on the sidewalk, "any ideas on this computer problem of ours?"

"Well stealing things it out of the question," Cameron crossed her arms and let the wind blow the hair out of her eyes, "Bare components are not going to be up to task with what we need them for at this time. That means manufacturing things ourselves, which is going to be tricky."

"You're thinking of doing it here?" John asked, swinging both legs around so he could face her, "Cam, the chemicals and fumes are gonna be killer in there. We'd have to be rocking three air conditioners with fans just to keep things bearable."

"Well it beats waiting for ten more years until a USB device is invented, John," Cameron looked out at the traffic on the street as her mind was running through various things subconsciously. "If I can seal the other apartment off, that would work."

"How are you gonna even get your hands on that stuff?" John slipped down from the banister and opened the front door, holding out his hand for her, "You can't just buy it from Best Buy."

"Let me worry about it," Cameron took his hand and walked inside with him, "For now you need to lay off the erratic eating until I can get _that_ taken care of."

Her hand patted his abdomen as she walked past him and sat down on the couch. She propped her legs up on the coffee table while John came and sat next to her. His arm rested behind her neck as he too stretched out and relaxed on the sofa.

"How did you like the waterbed?" He asked, sleep starting to creep its way back into his voice.

"It was...interesting," Cameron toyed with a lock of hair that had been tickling her right ear while she thought of the previous night. Most of her time had been spent trying to find equilibrium so that she could power down and go to sleep. The task seemed so easy at first but proved to be monumental due to the constant moving from the water underneath her.

"Yea, they take some getting used to," John snickered and leaned his head back on the cushion behind him. "They keep you cool though, you don't have to worry about sweating to death when you're on one."

"Mmm" Cameron nodded in reply as she stopped playing with her hair and turned her head to watch John. She watched intently as his nostrils flared slightly with each breath and the slight pulsing from his neck as his heart thumped. "I think I'm about to go try it out again."

She made her way over to the bottom of the stairs before John called out from the couch, "Do you mind if I join?"

"Not at all," She motioned for him to come up as she climbed the stairs toward her bedroom door.

* * *

"You're cold," John muttered, drawing the covers up around them as another chill went down his spine. He silently scolded himself for taking off his shirt before laying down in the bed as he was now about two degrees away from having his teeth chatter. Her body was cold to the touch, far cooler then normal. It reminded him of the bitter cold of Canada they had trekked through the day after Skynet had dropped the bombs on the Earth.

"It's the water," She replied, fluffing the pillow under her head and laying back down onto it. Cameron was taking note of the water temperature and her body when she pushed the data off of her HUD, effectively wiping everything clean.

"Can't help that you insisted on these thin covers," chuckled John, fanning the covers again and watching them fall back down and conform to her shape.

"I thought you would want the thicker ones," she whispered as she closed her eyes and let her mind wander.

"If you're having trouble I don't mind getting the short end of the straw every now and then, Cam," he turned over on to his back but kept his head turned towards her on his right.

A slight noise from below made Cameron snap her eyes open and reach for the gun taped to the underside of her headboard. John began to rise from the bed but a warning sign from Cameron stopped him. She threw the covers off of her and stood up with the gun by her side.

"Try not to move," she whispered and began softly moving across the room towards the door. The shirt she wore snagged on a splinter in the door-jam, ripping the cloth near her side.

John watched her move stealthily out of the room before he got up from the bed and grabbed a knife from his crumpled jeans on the floor. Cameron had just started making her way down the stairs when he popped his head out of the door and caught a death stare from her. If looks could kill, he was sure she would have murdered him in that instant but she continued quietly down the stairs as he remained in the doorway.

Her head had just disappeared from his view when he heard a familiar voice from down below, "Oh, Cameron! We, uh..."

_Shit, _John thought, _mom..._ He tried to not make any sounds as he crept back into the room and grabbed his shirt. His pocket knife slipped from his fingers when he grabbed for it and knocked the floor loudly as it hit the wooden surface.

_Nice, John,_ he scolded himself as he picked the knife up and slipped it into his pocket. _Try to be quiet and hit everything in the house why don't..._ In his haste John misjudged his distance and tripped over the overhang of Cameron's waterbed, sending him falling to the floor and a loud 'thunk'.

"You, okay?" He heard Cameron call from the bottom of the stairs. Her voice carried up the stairs and into the bedroom with both concern and laughter laced in her words.

_Why ask when you already know?_ John thought as he pushed himself up from the floor as if performing a push-up. He was nearly up when he felt a sharp pain near his navel. It was sharp and intense, increasing more and more as he pushed himself away from the floor. The pain wasn't anything new, it was something that he had all but ignored in the past two weeks, but this intensity brought him crashing back down on the floor.

"Cam," he tried to whisper through his gritted teeth so that only she would hear him, "get them out of here."

He rolled over onto his back and kept clenching his fists, sending the blood surging in and out of his veins. The pain increased and his vision began to blur. Soon the only thing he could make out of the ceiling was a vague white shape, no longer able to see the individual tiles anymore. A white and black blur started to materialize and increase in focus as it lowered itself on top of him.

"John?" Cameron asked, her face no more then a few inches above his, "John can you hear me?"

He tried to mutter a response but passed out as the pain took over him fully. The muscles in his jaws relaxed as he went under and finally allowed him to utter something incomprehensible to her. Cameron easily picked him up and set his body on her waterbed and then spun on her heels to see both Kyle and Sarah standing in her doorway.

"Kyle, I need my bag. Throw it here," She pointed to the blue satchel leaning against the baseboard of the room.

Kyle knelt down and tossed the bag over to her as Sarah stepped into the room with a look of shock on her face. She walked over to the other side of the bed and watched the sweat beginning to accumulate on John's brow.

"Sarah, you and Kyle need to go," Cameron's hands were rummaging through the bag until they found her knife buried deep in one of the compartments. "You don't need to be here for this."

"Is he gonna be okay?" Sarah asked through her staggered breathing. Her eyes were focusing on the blade in Cameron's hands.

"Kyle, get her out of here," Cameron didn't look up at either of them. She kept her focus on John as her hand and the blade cut the shirt open, revealing a large black area to the right of his bellybutton. "Both of you wait downstairs, please."

Sarah reluctantly followed Kyle as he lead her out of the room. She cast a look over her shoulder to see Cameron cutting open the black area on John's abdomen with her knife.

Kyle took a seat next to Sarah on the sofa and offered her a cup of coffee. She took it hesitantly as her hand were trembling from the sight of Cameron's knife digging into John's skin. The image had been burned into her mind for the past half hour. It hadn't helped that he had woken up in the middle of whatever she was doing to him and screamed for his life.

The sound of him screaming was something that Sarah was sure would keep her awake for the next few days. She had watched dozens of movies where an action hero cried out in pain or someone going through an emotional ordeal snaps; and all of them paled in comparison to the real thing. His screamed filled her ears again as she remembered it, causing her fingers to loose their grip on the cup sending it crashing to the floor.

Kyle put his arm around her shoulders and gently rubbed in small circles trying to comfort her, "It'll pass."

Sarah looked up at him as a loose tear finally fell down her cheek, "What the hell?"

"It'll pass," he repeated, "the jitters of it all. We had to get used to it in the future. The first two years were nothing but mission-packed days and the sounds of people sobbing themselves to sleep."

"Its different," Sarah said, looking down at the puddle of coffee soaking into the carpet between her feet. "He's different."

"I know," Kyle gave her another rub of the shoulder as the sound of Cameron's footsteps filled their ears. Sarah kept looking at the stain in the carpet while Kyle looked over his shoulder at Cameron.

What lay before his eyes was a vision of Cameron that Kyle had never seen before. To him, she looked like someone who had just slaughtered someone in the most brutal way possible but her face told a different story. The visage of her body told Kyle to get the hell out of the house, the emotion on her face told him that John might be dead upstairs.

Blood covered her arms and hands all the way up to her elbows along with smears of blood all over the shirt she was wearing and her bare legs. The thick black blood on her arms was slowly trickling down and making wet 'plops' as it hit the wooden stairs, leaving a trail of blood droplets up to her bedroom. There was a smudge of blood that ran across her cheeks that bore the resemblance of finger marks from when John had woken up and tried to move. Her hunting knife was still clenched in her hand along with a cigarette lighter, which he had no idea what the purpose of that was for.

"Kyle, can you help me for a moment?" Cameron asked, stopping at the last step so she wouldn't get blood on the carpet floor.

"Sure," he replied, giving Sarah a reassuring pat on the shoulder before standing up and following Cameron back up the stairs.

The trail of droplets lead back to Cameron's bedroom door, which remained opened. To Kyle's relief, John was unconscious and alive. He was laying on the left side of her bed though his breathing was pretty shallow. John's skin was so pale it looked like he had been scared to death or he had seen a ghost. The wound on his stomach had been sewn shut by Cameron via a fabric from her bag, which she picked up from the side of the bed and started rummaging through.

"The hell was wrong with him," Kyle asked, not moving further into the room while Cameron took a seat next to John on the bed.

"Appendix," Cameron replied, "it must have ruptured when he fell." Her hands disappeared into her bag only to pull a long tube out of it. The long opaque tube curled itself around in circles as she looked up at Kyle, "Can you take a seat over here, please?"

"I, uh...what for?" Kyle stammered, looking at the needle that was currently being inserted into John's left arm.

"He needs a transfusion," replied Cameron, "I don't have time to go anywhere else, so please sit down."

It was the look in her eyes that told him to obey and take the seat next to hers. They were cold and piercing in their penetrating stare but something else underneath the hard exterior told him to trust her. Kyle could feel the connection between them as he always had, even from his time spent with them in the future. He supposed it was fear or desperation, though the idea a machine could experience those emotions were alien to him even after being around her for years.

"This is going to sting," Cameron said, turning mechanically from John's side and inserting a needle connected to the other end of the tube to his arm.

She was wrong, it didn't sting nor did it even hurt. As far as shots went it was the painless one he had ever experienced. His eyes watched as Cameron lightly pulled on the apparatus in the middle of the tube, filling a plunger with his blood in the process. Her eyes were studying his commanding officer even as her fingers hit the switch and the blood began flowing from the plunger and into John.

"He going to be okay?" Kyle asked.

"If he stabilizes he should be fine," Cameron said a little flatly.

"If?" Kyle raised his eyebrows and leaned in towards her.

The wound on John's stomach didn't seem too harsh to him. Even if it was bad, Cameron was experienced and knew what she was doing. If John trusted her with his life, that was good enough for Kyle to believe in as well.

"I needed more time to get supplies," she said quietly, "He's going to be in a lot of pain when he wakes up."

"How bad was it?" Kyle sat back in his chair as she hit the switch and began pulling blood from his arm again to fill the plunger.

"I was able to remove the appendix, but it was already ruptured," Cameron cut off her own voice, finding herself unable to continue to speak.

Kyle watched as she started to pump the blood into John's arm again. He had never paid much attention to how the two of them interacted. To him they were two people who were close and had always shared a connection that he was sure only a few people truly knew about. The way they looked at each other sometimes was enough to tell that they had both been through too many ordeals to count, and they had always had each others backs.

"Hey," Kyle said, laying his free hand on Cameron's shoulder, "Its going to be okay."

"If it gets infected I'm not sure if he can survive another surgery without proper equipment," Cameron started before being cut off by Kyle.

"He's going to be okay," Kyle asserted, "Trust me."

Cameron gave him a faint smile as she switched the plunger again and started to draw blood from Kyle's arm. She watched the thick fluid flow down in the spirals of the tube and collect in the well located in the center.

"This should be enough," she told him as she began sending the final push of blood into John. "You can pull that out if you like. There are bandages in the bag, probably soaked in blood though."

"Thanks," Kyle grunted as he extracted the needle, "How'd you know he was the same blood type as me? I mean isn't that a thing? Can't donate to people who aren't the same blood type?"

"I'm not sure if John would want me telling you," she half-frowned and half-smiled at him.

Kyle nodded as if he understood and rose from his seat. A faint feeling took over him and he plopped back down into the seat with force.

"Woo," he joked, "I think you got enough."

"I need more, but you don't need to give anymore then you already have," Cameron said.

"Does this have to do with Sarah?" Kyle asked suddenly, causing Cameron to look around and eye him suspiciously. "I know that she's..." He gestured towards John as his hands grabbed a bandage in her bag.

"No," Cameron said, though Kyle could hear the lie in her tone.

"Somethings going on," said Kyle. He extracted the bandage and laid it over the needle-mark in his arm, "I at least deserve to know what it is."

"John should be the one to tell you," she lowered the tone of her voice to convey authority, hoping that Kyle would drop the issue.

"To tell me what, I'm his father?" Kyle watched carefully as a look of surprise rippled across Cameron's face.

"How long have you..."

"Sarah told me about you two in the garage," Kyle said, "It didn't take too long for me to figure out my role in everything. Kind of weird when I first thought about it, being like the mythical figure that everybody heard about but nobody really knew existed."

"I...uh," Cameron was at a loss for words as Kyle held up his hand to stop her.

"Its alright," he smirked, "So how are things going? I mean, past-present-future wise? Things happening like they were _supposed_ to?"

"None of this has happened before," Cameron looked at him, confused more and more as he spoke.

"So...wait what?" Kyle ran his hand through his hair and waited for her to continue.

"This isn't what happened to John in the past...present," Cameron corrected herself, even though she was unsure if she should or not.

"So what happened to his father according to John?" Kyle looked over at the sleeping man on the bed as his chest swelled and deflated with air repeatedly.

"John was in command of Western Allied Resistance, worldwide. Along with an elite group of soldiers under the command of Justin Perry, he led an assault on Skynet Central. Near the end of the mission he unearthed evidence of Skynet utilizing a new technology to send an advanced infiltrator unit through time," Cameron looked into Kyle's eyes to make sure he was keeping up with her.

"You volunteered to be sent after the machine to 1984, meeting Sarah Connor in the process. Two days after arriving you died protecting Sarah from the T-800 unit. John was born nine months later," she looked back to John as her fingers pulled the needle from his arm.

"So thats it?" he asked, feeling like all the wind was pushed out of his lungs at once, "We met, then I died?"

"Yes," Cameron replied.

"Well what happened after?" Kyle continued his line of questions that had been brewing in his mind for the past few months, "When did Stark arrive?"

"There was no Stark," Cameron told him, "John grew up with his mother in Central America and the Southwest United States until age 8 when Sarah was incarcerated at Pescadero State Mental Hospital in California for attempting to blow up a computer factory where she believed Skynet was being created."

"The arrival of a T-1000 unit and reprogrammed T-800 unit caused another rift in the future timeline as both were destroyed along with Cyberdyne's main research facility on their project with the military; Skynet," she stopped for a breath of air before continuing, "They lived on the run for two years until I found them. Both of them were still determined to prevent Judgment Day from happening and we investigated leads for two years until Sarah died. We waited for the bombs to fall and survived our first few months alone until we met up with pockets of the resistance. I believe you know the rest of the story."

"So none of this has happened before?" Kyle asked again, trying to wrap his head around time travel and what Cameron called shifting timelines. "Neither of you know what is going on?"

Cameron shook her head in reply.

"Shit...well what do we do?" Kyle asked, finally able to stand up without feeling like he was about to faint.

"That is a question for John," Cameron said, looking up at him again while she took hold of John's right hand, "there is some orange juice in the fridge, it should help with the nausea."

Kyle nodded and turned towards the door before stopping after his first step, "You said you needed more?"

Cameron looked up at him again, "You need to rest until tomorrow. John should be fine until then if nothing gets infected."

"Sarah and I'll be staying here till he wakes up," he said, taking another step towards the door, "You guys have any spare room?"

"Third door on the left," Cameron replied, "I'll be here if you need anything."

"Ooh-rah," Kyle said to himself as he left the bedroom and closed the door behind him. He made his way to the bathroom to wash the blood off of his hands before rejoining Sarah downstairs.

Cameron watched the door close behind Kyle before turning her attention back to John. He was sleeping peacefully now, which was a good thing. She hoped he wouldn't wake up for at least a day or two until the pain had lessened somewhat.

"Ooh-rah," Cameron whispered while laying down next to him on the bed, throwing the covers and an extra blanket over him to keep his body warm.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

* * *

**? ?, ?**

**?**

**?, ?**

**Mid-day**

* * *

"Why do you always do that?" Sarah asked while taking another bite of her sandwich. Her eyes were watching John intently as she ate.

"Do what?" John asked in reply, "This?" He held up a frozen pop tart which he had been gnawing on and showed it to her. Even though the treat had been thawing for the past few minutes it was still pretty frozen solid from the cold of the freezer which he had taken if from.

"Yea," Sarah said, turning to look at Kyle as well, "You two always eat stuff cold sometimes. You don't heat stuff up unless its already made that way." She brushed a lock of hair from her face while her head turned from Kyle to John, waiting on an explanation from either of them.

"There weren't many microwaves in the future," Kyle wrapped an arm around Sarah and gave John a wink. He took a hard bite of his own frozen pastry while Sarah budged him off of her and snickered at him.

"You get used to it after awhile," John replied to her, "the whole damn world is a cold place, the food isn't any different." He shifted his weight in the chair, making his side send a slight pain through his body.

Sarah lowered her gaze to her sandwich while Cameron gave him a bump in the leg from under the table. John swallowed his load of pop-tart to apologize but stopped himself from doing so before he uttered the first syllable. Right now he didn't see or feel the need to explain himself, she understood what he meant by what he had said.

As John swallowed the mash of pastry in his mouth and followed it down with a gulp of orange juice the pain in his side returned in full force. It was sudden and an immediate crippling pain which sent his upper body lurching over the table and grasping for anything to clench or squeeze to help relieve some tension with. The incision wound was acting up again for the hundredth time making John clutch his side and rub it tenderly.

John looked up to see everyone at the table looking towards him with a look of express concern littered across their faces. None of them moved or even seemed to be breathing as they watched him reel from the pain of his wound. They remained placid and still, but watched him as if he were an interesting program on television.

"Gonna go lay down for a little while," He said while he stood from the table and made his way over to the doorway leading from the kitchen to the living room.

"I can help," Cameron offered, standing up from her seat as well.

John gave no verbal reply as he staggered towards the bedroom door and pushed it open. His body continued to tremble as he moved across the open space for the bed situated against the wall. He could hear Cameron's audible footsteps behind him but mentally remarked on how she offered no assistance to him even after she could clearly see he needed help. The bed offered little cushion as he fell down onto it rather harshly, unable to slowly lower himself onto it in time to break his fall.

"So what are you here for?" John didn't try to hide the sarcasm in his voice as he spoke to her, "Doctor me up again?" He watched as she stood over him surveying his body. Her eyes looked like they were piercing through him, almost as if she were giving him an x-ray.

Cameron's brow furrowed as she replied to him, "I didn't do that to you."

"What are you talking about," John hissed as he snatched the bandage from his side, "Like _hell_ you didn't, take a look at your handiwork doctor."

John looked down at the source of the pain in his side to see thin and wire-like mechanical things protruding from his skin. Three wires were arranged in a triangular pattern across his abdomen as they hummed from something sending energy to them from underneath the flesh. He looked back up at Cameron to see her ghoulishly smiling.

"You did that to yourself..."

* * *

The vehicle around him jarred John into reality as he lurched from side to side inside the metallic confines of the backseat. It was a Humvee or at least the back of one as far as he could tell. His body surged up in the air as the tires ran over something large causing pain to course through his abdomen when he came crashing back down in the seat.

John blinked his eyes tightly and felt a swoosh of air hit him hard when his eyelids opened. He was weightless and flying through the air high above the Earth. Everything passed under him as he flew over the barren landscape that had been scorched by countless bombs. Fog and mist started to enter his vision as he soared up above a thin layer of clouds. He watched as weight and gravity returned to his body slightly as he came to a rest on top of a wisp of smoke in mid-air.

The sun shown clearly and its rays rushed over him, warming his body and setting him at ease even though he was thousands of feet above land. John closed his eyes and reopened them to make sure nothing was changing but as he opened his eyes everything remained the same. He felt a cool hand on his shoulder and looked back to see his mom taking a seat next to him.

She wasn't the face he had gotten used to seeing in the present day, but her hardened exterior he knew from his past. He could see the pain etched into her face and body as she sat down next to him. That was something that she was never able to hide, even when she was trying to be happy or nice; she always had sadness or pain on her face.

"Hey, you," John said, his voice carrying over the endless space and repeating itself in a never-ending echo.

"Hey," she replied.

"I should have told you I was coming up here," John laid a hand on her lap and gently rubbed his thumb against her smooth skin.

"Sometimes you just want to get away," Sarah said, looking over and giving him a comforting smile. "I understand."

John smiled in kind to her and continued to rub her thigh, warming the silk skin with each pass of his thumb. They sat there in silence for a lifetime, letting the sun wash over them while its rays were absorbed by the clouds leaving the Earth below it cold and desperate.

"Sometimes you just want to get away," Sarah repeated suddenly, laying a hand on his shoulder.

"Yea..." John started to say before being stopped by Sarah's left hand placing itself over his mouth.

"We can't afford distractions, John," Sarah climbed in front in front of him and put her face an inch away from his, "You have to go now."

With a firm push, he passed through the thin layers of cloud and plummeted to the ground as Sarah watched him fall from her perch in the sun.

* * *

"Huah!" John's body shook on Cameron's bed, sending the water underneath him sloshing around.

His eyes adjusted to being open for the first time in who-knows how long. The blurry visage of the room slowly gave way to shadows and then shapes. It took a long time for his eyes to adjust, partially because the room was bathed in a grayish hue from the darkness that lay outside. Judging by the hour he deemed it to be somewhere around midnight or a little after. A car passed by on the street outside causing beams of soft light to enter Cameron's window and trail off until they left the room in the blackness again.

John tried to move but found himself unable to. The pain from his stomach made it impossible to move even and inch without sending paralyzing jolts of discomfort surging through his body. He tried to move once more but found the result to be the same and finally rested his head back on the pillow and stared at the ceiling above. A cool piece of steel or metal brushed against his arm and he shivered painfully from the coolness of its touch.

"John?" Cameron whispered groggily.

He tried to respond to her but found his mouth and throat too dry to even try and make a legitimate response. Cameron heard him trying to communicate and gently raised herself up from the bed to make the water under them be as calm as possible until she reached a seated position. John felt her hand running over his body, checking for something as it roamed.

"Can you squeeze my hand?" she asked, taking hold of his left hand and getting a squeeze in response.

"One for yes, two for no. Are you in any pain?" Cameron waited for a single squeeze but received two from him.

"Do you need any pain pills?" again she received the opposite response then she would have thought as he squeezed her hand twice.

"Are you sure?" she eyed him cautiously but again only had her hand squeezed twice. "We have plenty in supply. I raided the local hospital, we're good on everything."

John worked his hand free of her grasp and tried to signal something to her that would resemble water, but failed miserably. Cameron only looked on at him with a puzzled expression as he mimed various things to her. He finally let his hand drop to his side and felt the ripples of the water passing under him as the force dispersed. John picked his hand up again and pointed towards the bed, repeatedly tapping it for emphasis.

"I can do that," Cameron said after finally understanding what he was asking for. She lifted herself off the bed and made her way to the door, stopping to cast a final glance over him before turning and exiting.

Her footsteps were lost to any ear in the house but hers and she walked down the stairs and into the kitchen. She tried to make as little noise as possible as the water flowed from the tap of the sink and into the glass she held in her hand. As the water neared the rim of the cup she turned the knob to the off position and turned to see Sarah in the doorway.

"He awake?" she asked without even the slightest hint of tiredness in her voice.

Cameron nodded in reply.

"I'll be up in a few," Sarah said. She turned from the doorway and made her way back over to the couch where Kyle was sleeping.

Cameron made her way back up the stairs and entered her room to see that John had managed to pull himself up from a laying position and had his back propped against the headboard. It took her by surprise that he was even able to move but quietly thanked the antibiotics and painkillers that were mixed into his iv-drip for working. She walked over with a slight smile and took a seat beside him on the side of the bed, raising the glass to his parched lips and tilting it towards him.

The water surged into his mouth and he swallowed it eagerly, letting the cool sensation spread from his lips to his throat as it soothed him back to life. It brought comfort as the liquid passed to his stomach and began to ease the pain in his throat from the dry feeling he had been experiencing. John had nearly downed the entire glass when Cameron removed it from his lips and set it on the nightstand before turning back to him, her free hand turning on the lamp by the bed as she did.

A soft glow of light filled the room as John squinted from the sudden intrusion to his eyes. It was only momentary before he was able to open them again to see Cameron's face waiting for him with the traces of a smile forming on her lips.

"How long was I out," He rasped, his voice still raw.

"The better part of three days," she replied, laying a hand on his bandage that wrapped around his waist. "I need to change this before Sarah comes up."

She eyed him for approval but saw nothing to suggest to her that he didn't wish for the bandage to be changed. Her hands began to unravel the long piece of gauze until it was a pile of crumbled tissue on the floor that she tossed into the trash bin next to the bed. Cameron took great care to lift the bandage from his skin carefully knowing that the area under it was still tender. The old bandage was tossed in the trash as a new one was selected from her bag near the foot of the bed and placed over his scar along with a new dressing of gauze before she removed her hands from his torso.

"Thanks," John half-grunted from the pain, trying to keep it hidden from his voice.

"John," Cameron said, "We have plenty of painkillers, enough to probably last all three of you for a year. You sure you don't need one?"

John mulled over the thought in his head before nodding for a pill. He watched her dig through the large bag of supplies that she had before piping up, "Give me something that is not going to knock me out."

"That makes like half the stuff in here not usable," she looked up at him from her bag but saw the pleading look on his face.

Cameron finally selected a vicodin pill but pinched it in half so it would be less likely to put him to sleep. If she had known that stipulation she would have stolen something a lot less powerful. The only thing on her mind when she had raided the hospital was getting the strongest thing available, all of which would knock him out for at least a few hours.

"Thanks," John said as she popped the pill in his mouth.

He let the pill follow the water down his throat as he sipped the remnants of the liquid from the glass. The cool water once again trailed down into his stomach and sent a cool wave throughout his body, making him shiver from the cold of it combined with the bed below him. John looked up at Cameron again and was surprised to see her in the state she was in.

Normally she was the epitome of trying to be as clean as possible at all times. It wasn't that she didn't look clean now, but she looked like she had ran a marathon across the continent and then spent the following month without sleeping. Her shoulders were sagging, her back was hunched as she leaned across the bed and checked the bandage again, and her face looked as if she were about to pass out from sleep at any given moment.

"When did you say mom was coming?" he asked, feigning a sleepy expression as he spoke.

"In a minute or so," Cameron replied, lifting herself off the side of the bed to lay down next to him again.

"Too bad," John said, "I think she's about to be disappointed."

He reached out and rested a hand on her arm and gently slid back down into a sleeping position on his back. The pain coming from his chest was excruciating but he tried to keep it from showing in his face as Cameron studied his every move.

"It would be rude of me to fall asleep when she gets here," her voice trailed off as she closed her eyes.

"I think she'll understand," said John, watching as her eyes didn't open and she went to sleep.

He heard footsteps on the stairs and braced himself for the inevitable craziness that was normally expected out of his mom whenever he had gotten hurt. John would never forget the time in the jungle when he had tried to play with some animal twice his size. Sarah had freaked out and chased the thing away, scolding John for the remainder of the week in the process.

The door creaked open and in walked Kyle and Sarah, quietly shutting the door behind them and offering faint hello's as they entered the room. Sarah was the first to come over to his side but she remained very reserved from what he was expecting. There were no roaming hands that checked for wounds or bullet holes, nor did she pry at the bandage to see the quality of Cameron's 'work'. She remained standing next to him and only watched him laying there without saying anything.

Kyle was much more vocal, "Hey there, sir." he said quietly but in a jesting manner, "How many times we told you that if you eat crap for food that it'd eventually come to bite ya in the ass."

John tried to muster a laugh but wound up coughing and reeling from the pain it induced in reply.

"What he meant to say," Sarah popped Kyle in the shoulder, "is, it's good to see you awake." She took a seat next to Kyle and reached out to lay a hand on John's leg.

They both remained silent for a moment, apparently too worried about making noise and disturbing Cameron to ask him any questions. John took the opportunity of silence to ask them a few things.

"So, three day's huh?" he croaked from the bed, getting a nod from both Kyle and Sarah.

"Are you feeling any better? I mean," Kyle corrected himself mid-sentence, "better then before?"

"Dunno," John said, "can't really feel anything at the moment." He gestured towards the IV drip bag hovering over the headboard, "She's got me on the good stuff."

"Be sure to ask for some next time you stump your toe," Kyle joked.

Sarah frowned at him before turning back to John, "Do you need anything?"

"Nah," he replied, "I'm good right now."

Kyle shifted his focus from John to Cameron as he asked, "Does she? I mean...is she?"

"Asleep?" John returned his question with one of his own to receive a nod in reply, "Yea. And yes, she really _is _and _does_ sleep."

"Huh," Kyle muttered to himself before looking back at John, "learn something new everyday don't ya."

"I guess so," John chuckled in return, the medicine beginning to dull the pain that grew as well as his senses. "Listen guys, I'm pretty beat. Can we do this again in the morning?"

"Yea," Kyle said, rising from his seat and standing behind Sarah, "sure thing man."

Kyle nudged Sarah's arm and they both rose to leave the room. The amber glow from the lamp on the nightstand did nothing to keep John awake as they closed the door behind them. He dozed off again, this time hoping for a change in pace in his dreams.

* * *

John opened his eyes to the cool morning breeze that swept from the window above his head. He couldn't tell how long he had been asleep immediately, there was nothing to judge that was located inside Cameron's room. She didn't even have a clock sitting on the nightstand which was currently reserved for bottles of pills and rolls of gauze for his bandages.

He rolled his head to the left but didn't see Cameron laying near him nor sitting in the room. There were no voices coming from outside the room or even downstairs that he could discern, for all intensive purposes he assumed that he was alone in the house. A chill went down his spine as the covers were pushed aside by the wind from outside as it began to nip at his bare chest. John shivered from the cold but noticed that there was no pain coming from his chest.

It took him a moment to sit up fully but there was still nothing to be felt as he rose and stood on his feet. John looked around the room again but came up empty in his search for anyone for the second time.

_Weird,_ he thought as he scratched his itching scalp. The bandage wrapped around his stomach unraveled and fell to the floor like a feather as he made no movement to catch it. John's eyes searched over his belly but found no trace of a scar nor any sign of surgery.

_The fuck?_ John plied the skin looking for a scar but came up dry, there were none to be found.

A sound of laughter approached his ears and he snapped around, fully alert. Again, he found the room to be empty but the laughter kept repeating itself in his mind. John brushed the drapes of Cameron's window aside and looked out at the wasteland that filled his vision.

The house remained the only testament to the world that once was as he scanned everything to the horizon and saw nothing but the burnt bleakness of Skynets handiwork. John turned his head and saw the source of the laughter down below on what should have been the street outside.

Cameron was leading what appeared to be a small group of children, all too young to even stand as tall as her waist, to the center of the road. He watched from above as she knelt in front of them and whispered something into their ears. Whatever it was, it cause them to giggle uncontrollably again as Cameron laid down on the road and extended her arms and legs out from her body.

The children followed Cameron's lead and laid down on the road as well, all of them mimicking her pose. They seemed to be staring up at the sky, waiting for something, until Cameron started moving her legs and arms back and forth forming what should have been a snow angel. Dust and dirt gave way underneath her and the children as the shapes of angels were imprinted on the asphalt under them.

John blinked repeatedly but found the image in front of him to be the same as he opened them again. Cameron appeared to be making snow angels with children outside. A distant hum started filling his ears, a mechanical whir, and he yelled out of the window down to them. He could hear his own voice telling them to watch out, that something was coming, but they obviously couldn't hear him.

Spinning on his heels, John sprinted out of the bedroom and down the stairs before running towards the front door of the house. A voice caught his attention and brought him to a stop before his hand could spin the doorknob.

"Where are you going?" Cameron asked, standing in the living room in front of the love seat.

"Wha...I...uh," he tried to form words but found himself unable to.

"You're leaking," Cameron said, walking over to him and placing her hand over his navel.

John looked down and saw a metallic goo oozing from between her fingers as she pressed them into his skin. It had the appearance of mercury but flowed as if it were more viscous, almost as if it were blood. He was at a loss for words again as the pain started returning to his stomach, slow at first but then it hit him like a ton of bricks on his chest.

"Its okay," Cameron helped him over to the sofa and kept pressure on his metallic wound, "Everything's going to be okay."

* * *

John shook himself awake with an inaudible noise as the memories of the dream began to fade from his mind. It was still night outside but the nightstand lamp had been switched off, casting the eerie blackness of nightly shadows into the room. He could feel Cameron's cool body pressing against his side and eased himself back down onto the bed.

His stomach was growling, letting him know that he had probably been asleep for more then a day again. He rubbed his stomach with his right hand to try and sooth it, not wanting to get up or make an attempt to leave the bed because of the dull pain in his side. John's hand ran over his bandage and stopped.

Something wet was seeping through the multiple layers of gauze and smearing itself on his hand. He raised his hand up to catch the moonlight coming in through the window and saw small traces of blood on his fingers.

_Nice going, John,_ he told himself as he lowered his hand, _can't even wake-up without busting stitches._

He remembered Cameron's bag of supplies and hoped it was still near his side of the bed. John slowly let his hand fall off the side of the bed and rummage quietly for any sign of the bag. After stretching his arm as much as he could without moving and waking Cameron, he finally felt the fabric on his fingertips and pulled it up to him.

The bag was full of just about anything he or she would be needing to see to his wound. John's eyes studied the ceiling as he poured all of his focus into his hands as they searched for something in the bag that resembled the feeling of gauze. He found a roll after a moment or so, along with a bottle of cold iodine.

John skillfully managed to unwrap the seemingly unending layers of gauze around his stomach without waking Cameron. He peeled off the old bandage and being unable to see where the trash-bin was, discarded it on the floor. The cap of the iodine came off with ease as he poured some on the new dressing and pressed it to his skin, making his stomach quiver from the coolness of the liquid. He managed to wrap the gauze around his stomach twice before Cameron stirred next to him.

"John?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

"Hey," he grunted as he pulled the gauze under his back and stretched it across his stomach for the third time. "Just getting this changed."

Cameron sat up on the bed fully and looked over at him, "If you needed help..."

"I can change my band-aid, mom," he said sarcastically while smiling.

"And I can crush things with my bare hands, you don't see me leaping to do that with everything," Cameron took hold of the gauze and tucked it under his back again, pulling it taunt and tying it off on his right side.

"Well, you get tired of people doing everything for you after awhile. Sometimes you just want to do something yourself," John said, trying not to sound offensive as he spoke.

"Everyone needs a hand sometimes," Cameron replied, laying down beside him and resting her head on his shoulder.

"What day is it?" he asked, leaning his head into hers and resting his chin on her forehead.

"April third," she replied, closing her eyes and beginning to drift off to sleep again.

"So, I've been here a month?" John looked bewildered as he mulled over that information again. It certainly didn't seem like he had been passed out that long.

"You're awake sometimes, but you never respond when we talk to you. You kind of just open your eyes and look around before mumbling something and going back to sleep," Cameron said, her voice trailing off as her systems forced her into standby.

John felt Cameron go limp slightly as he wrapped his left arm around her and placed his hand on her hip. She was leaning onto him fully, which would have been a problem were it not for the pressure being absorbed by the water in the bed below them. His arm began to fall asleep as the weight from her head started to cut the circulation off but he didn't mind. He looked up at the dim ceiling and let his mind wander until he too drifted off to sleep.

* * *

To Be Continued...

Happy April Fools!


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18**

* * *

**Duplex Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**April 6, 1986**

**8:17 PM**

* * *

"Push," Cameron asserted, her voice coming out strong and powerful but reserved at the same time.

It was as if she were asking him to move a brick wall with a toothpick. A brick wall that just so happened to have the appearance of an innocent teenage girl's hand. He tried to push up like she had asked him to but again found himself smitten with the same result, failure. It didn't matter how hard he willed himself to push harder, his body refused to cooperate after a certain extent of exertion. Once he reached a certain point his scar would send a signal of pain from his side, up to his shoulder, and down to the fingertips of his right arm.

Her version of physical therapy was a new brand of personal hell for him, but he kept his mouth shut about such matters to everyone in the house. They were supposed to be doing his therapy this morning but that had been prevented by Kyle and Sarah visiting again, both to keep him company and to drop off new computer parts and supplies for Cameron. John knew she only meant well for him, no matter how many times she grinned at the end of his sessions, deep down she was just wanting him to get back on his feet.

"Err...AH!" John grunted, letting his hand fall back down to his side. "Need a break, Cam."

He tried to breath in between his words, forcing the oxygen into his system to try and compensate for the tingling feeling in his fingers as the pain subsided. It was a trick one of the friends of his mother had taught him when they were living in Central America when he was young. The same thing worked as a variant for being punched or bruised badly, just rub the area furiously to force blood into it and the pain would eventually just go away.

Cameron smiled softly and lowered her hand onto the top of John's, entangling her fingers with his. She was measuring his progress for the day and comparing it to his previous session, marking a marginal twenty-eight percent increase from the previous meeting, both in longevity and how much he was able to achieve. Charts started forming, showing her that he wouldn't need further therapy after two more days if he kept healing at the rate he currently was.

It brought a smile to her face when she knew that it wouldn't be long until he was back to his normal self. The first few days of him being awake had been hard to go through. In the past month he had rarely stayed conscious for more then a few seconds at a time, it was only recently that he had been staying awake for practically as much as his body would allow him to. She had enjoyed the time they were spending together recently as it had little to do with talk of Stark nor Skynet, they had been free to simply enjoy each others company.

"That Kyle and mom?" John asked, throwing his left arm behind his head and leaning his head against the headboard as he heard the sound of a closing door downstairs.

Cameron's eyes moved towards the sound as did her head until she processed it fully through various programs in her chip to confirm that Kyle and Sarah were indeed on their way outside. The sound of car doors opening met her ears a second later, confirming the analysis that still lingered on her HUD. She turned back to John and nodded in reply.

"So how are we? Tech-wise?" John asked.

Cameron subconsciously frowned at his query but quickly corrected herself to answer, "I've been making some progress with the motherboards. The circuits and bare components of this era are difficult to work with, but everything is nearly ready to be assembled."

"Assembled?" John asked quizzically, sitting up a little on the bed as he asked. "I thought you were making a component to plug the chip in with? There more to it then that?"

"Well, yes. I had to construct a personal computer since none exist at this time. When it is assembled I'll need to write a simple shell program to run the hardware and design software to read whatever is on the chip," Cameron replied. "It is nothing overly complicated, but it does take time for everything to be made properly."

"Ah," John said, "Well that is a good thing, I guess." Her smile brightened a little as he continued with, "Where is the chip now?"

Cameron let go of his hand and stood up to make her way over to her dresser drawers. Her right hand opened the top drawer in the middle of the dresser to retrieve the chip. She raised it, looking over her shoulder at John as she did so that he could get an ample glance of the device before returning it to its resting place.

His eyes followed the chip back down until it was out of sight before John let his head fall back down on the pillow underneath him. The water in the bed sloshed beneath him as he shifted his weight on the bed as Cameron took her seat by his side again. An itch was manifesting itself above his scar which he tried to attend to but Cameron prevented him from scratching it.

"Let me check first," it sounded as if it were intended to be more of an order then a question, which John was sure would be the case if he pressed the issue further.

He rolled his eyes slightly and moved his hand out of the way, clenching it as he did when the itch started to be more intolerable. He felt her cool fingers on his skin as they worked to peel the bandage gently from his side. She ran a cold forefinger across his scar which made the entire right side of his body twitch. Cameron suppressed a smile from tickling him as she looked back up and leaned into the chair.

"All good," she crossed her arms, "have at it."

John's hands flew to his side, scratching furiously to sate the itch that lingered above the scar. His fingernails left white and red marks across his skin as they continued to calm down the violent itch. It took him a full minute before he was satisfied that the scar wouldn't be needing anymore rough attention for at least the next hour before he looked up to see Cameron pulling out clothes from her dresser.

"I'm going to jump in the shower," she threw her clothes over her forearm and turned around to see him staring back at her. "You could use one too."

Cameron's bare feet carried her over to him as she draped his left arm over her shoulder, pulling him from the bed up to his feet. For the last month he had been confined to her bedroom, and she figured that it was time for him to venture forth into the world again. What better way to do that then walk across the hall to the bathroom and possibly slip and fall while being pelted with water?

_Baby steps, _she told herself as John hobbled alongside her to the bathroom door.

With the turn of the knob they were inside the room and Cameron closed the door behind them, locking it before turning around to face him. John was already without his shirt which left him in the awkward position of removing his pajama bottoms. She decided to leave him with his dignity and stepped into the shower, pulling the curtain behind her to give them both a little privacy. Piece by piece she removed her own clothing and tossed them over the curtain before turning the water on, letting it heat up before he stepped inside the shower.

Just as the water had reached a decent level of warmth, John stepped in behind her trying to keep his balance by leaning against the cool tile wall. Cameron stood upright as she pulled the knob, making the water rain down on them from above. She went about grabbing the various products which were scattered around the rim of the tub while John remained leaning against the wall behind her, his arm clutching his side from being stretched by standing upright.

He watched as Cameron began to wash her hair, the warm water pelting her in the face as it washed the shampoo lather down onto her shoulders. The water bounced from her scalp and sprinkled on his chest and face as she turned and ran her fingers through the strands a final time before grabbing another product and lathering them up again. His heart started beating faster then normal as he watched her, the heat from the waters mist began steaming the air around them causing him to perspire.

John closed his eyes for a moment as he grew lightheaded and opened them to see Cameron less then an inch from his own face. She was staring back at him quietly, the only sounds filling the room were the rush of water from the shower-head and the noises it made when it came into contact with their bodies. He didn't move, not from trying to control himself but he was sure if he moved he would probably fall down.

"John?" Cameron's voice filled his ears as she talked to him. "You okay?"

"Yea, yea." he repeated, trying to push himself off of the wall but found himself leaning on it again.

Before he could open his mouth he felt a soapy sponge come into contact with his chest, rubbing itself in soothing circles then moving onto other patches of skin. Her hands moved behind him, massaging the soap into his shoulders in kneading semi-circles while he continued watching her face. The soap started to trickle down his back only to be picked up and rubbed into his skin again as she moved her hands lower, stopping at his lower back.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you were a bit preoccupied," John teased as she started to move her hands lower.

Cameron pulled her head back to get a good look at him and quirked an eyebrow at his remark. She gave him a wry-grin before moving her hands around his side and began the same motions of massaging the soap into his abdomen. Her hands hovered over the scar on his side as she took the soapy lather and ran her fingers along the sides of the red mark from his surgery.

John winced a little at the pain but also the tickling sensation that came from her touch, "Its gonna be all on you if you cause me to fall in here." He teased her by moving forward and giving her a small kiss on the cheek.

She only smiled in return as she lowered herself down and began to run the sponge over his calves before moving up to his thighs. When she moved from his right leg to his left, John dry-coughed absentmindedly causing Cameron to pause for a brief moment.

"Don't be shy," she said, and resumed the circular motions with the sponge on his leg.

Cameron stood in front of him again and handed him the sponge, "Think you can manage my back?" She asked, turning around and beginning to wash her front-side.

"Uh, sure," John squeezed the sponge slightly, causing most of the soapy lather to fall down next to his feet.

He picked up the tube of product she had used a few minutes ago and started to work it into the sponge, causing the thick foam to cover his hands. She didn't react at all when his hands touched her back and he moved in closer to her as much as his body would allow him to move. They both fell silent as the water soaked them from above, sending the soapy remains down to the collecting water near the drain.

John continued moving the sponge along her back, following the slender curve of her spine from the nape of her neck to where her pelvis would lay. His hands moved in long and soothing strokes as he passed from the left side of her back over to the right, then he moved to her sides. He lost himself in the repetitive motions of his hands on her skin until he heard her voice reach his ears.

"John? _John_," she said, jokingly. "If you scrub anymore you're going to scrap away the skin."

He realized his mistake and withdrew his hands from her side, "Oh, sorry."

"Don't worry about it," she lifted herself slightly onto the balls of her feet and planted her lips on his. Her arms wrapped around his neck as she pulled her face away from his, breaking the lip-lock. "You good to go?"

"Uh, yea. _Yea!_" he said suddenly after regaining his senses.

Cameron pulled the curtain back and stepped outside of the shower, leaving him to stand alone with his weight resting against the tile until she returned with a towel. He attempted to take it from her but she kept her grip placed firmly on the delicate fabric and made a motion for him to turn around. The towel made contact with his skin, sending a slight shock-wave down his back as Cameron guided it around the various parts of his body absorbing the skin as it passed.

"Cam," John said, looking over his shoulder at her, "I think I'm grown enough to do this myself."

She remained silent and continued to dry him with the towel until nothing remained soaked in water except for his lengthening hair. Cameron ruffled the towel into his hair and left it sitting on his head.

"What you _could_ use, is a hair-cut," she teased, stepping away from him and grabbing her own towel. "C'mere and sit down."

Her hand patted the seat of the commode which John sat on after hobbling out of the shower. Cameron draped her towel around his shoulders and opened the top drawer of the counter under the sink to retrieve a pair of scissors and a comb. John eyed them warily but didn't protest as she began to comb his hair into a suitable position for her to start cutting it. He had always preferred his hair to be long and generally kept it that way. There were very brief times where he would willingly keep his hair at a short length, and this was not one of those times.

"Don't chop off too much," he warned her before relaxing his shoulders and back.

"So no crew cut?" she asked, laughing as he opened his eyes and gave her a death-stare of his own. "Right, no crew cuts."

John closed his eyes and tried to relax his mind as she started trimming his bangs. He lost track of time as his mind finally let go of everything that was plaguing his mind and finally allowed him to meditate on things that he had been wanting to. The slow cuts of the scissors on his hair by Cameron added to this effect, sending his thoughts far to the back of his mind and providing a soothing, almost trance-like effect.

"There you go," Cameron removed the towel from around his shoulder and let the clumps of wet hair fall to the floor, "One John Conner special."

He ran his fingers over his hair and sighed in relief when he noticed that he still had quite a bit of length. John stood and looked at himself in the mirror and was taken aback by who he saw. He had always tried to keep himself in shape but what stood in front of him in the reflection looked like a taller and scarred version of the ten-year-old that met Uncle Bob. Not an ounce of muscle on his bones at all, and his face looked rounded then it normally was when compared to his other physique.

"Looks like I'm gonna be hitting the gym," he joked, turning from the mirror and pulling Cameron closer to him until they were mere millimeters apart. "Thanks for the mop-cut."

"No problem," she grinned, "Now sweep this up and meet me downstairs for dinner." Cameron motioned to his hair littered on the floor and the broom nestled by the door before making her way out of the room.

* * *

**Duplex Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**April 25, 1986**

**1:43 PM**

* * *

Cameron snapped in the last piece of self-made hardware into the crudely assembled motherboard and lifted herself up to see her handiwork. It had taken quite some time, and a few times where she was nearly caught stealing equipment, but she had managed to build a personal desktop computer almost from scratch in the past month. The various wires and solder holding it together crisscrossed over each other to-and-fro as they lead from one destination on the board to another. A slight smile crept upon her lips as she took pride in her accomplishment.

All that remained now was to design the software to run the hardware she had designed, which would take her little to no time at all. She knew of the limitations imposed on the system she had built and couldn't make a fully functional operating system, but something simple enough for reading a disc should be well within its capabilities. The only thing she needed to worry about was the formatting of the chip which had been stolen from Stark, it would have to be a trial and error run of figuring out how he had stored the information on the chip before she could read it.

"Hello," came John's voice from behind her, "Lady of the night." He came up from behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. "Still slaving over this thing?"

Cameron leaned into him, placing her head on his left shoulder, "I actually just finished. I was thinking of getting some dinner before designing the software for the chip."

As if it had heard Cameron talk, John's stomach let out a growl after she spoke. They both chuckled and turned from the computer heading towards the door that separated their apartment from the one where all of Cameron's computer equipment lay.

"Were you wanting anything in particular?" Cameron asked, walking through the door and making her way toward the kitchen.

"A sandwich is fine with me," John replied, falling in step behind her after closing the door to the other duplex.

Cameron rolled her eyes and stepped into the kitchen away from John's sight. She started rummaging through the cupboards but came up empty to anything that she was craving, until she stopped and turned toward the refrigerator. Her hands removed the ad from the magnet and looked at it carefully before laying her eyes on the phone. The key-tone rang in her hair twice before the man from the local pizza-parlor answered, ready to take her order.

John was stretched out on the couch with his face scrutinizing the ceiling up above them. It was the only remaining thing of the crappy-cowboy theme left in the place. One thing he didn't remember about the eighties was the growing fad of hanging wallpaper on ceilings. His eyes moved over the faux-wooden plank designs that the former tenants had hung and rolled his eyes at it. He heard the small pat of feet that he knew to be Cameron and closed his eyes, feigning sleep.

Cameron peeked over the back of the couch and saw him pretending to be asleep. _He should know that in order to fool me he would have to do better at controlling his heart-beat and other...what if his intent is to let me know that he is faking?_ This train of thought opened up intriguing possibilities, ones that she had seldom experienced at all. By conventional analysis, John was teasing her into doing something which would leave her with an obvious choice of either playing along, calling him out, or believing in his rouse to delay a reaction from him.

Her mind was swirling with things to do before she pushed them aside and hopped over the back of the couch. Cameron made sure she wouldn't land directly on John to avoid any broken limbs that would happen if her skeleton came crashing down on his, but nevertheless she landed right over him with her arms and legs straddling him. Slowly and hesitantly she found herself lowering her face to his, gently touching her lips to his.

After a moment she pulled herself away from him quickly, "Sorry I..."

John cut her off by pushing himself up to meet her again, her words emulating a slow moan as they kissed again. She let him be the guide as they maneuvered themselves on the couch, now with her laying under him. They broke contact only momentarily before they were connected again. John's muscular body twitched above her before coming to rest on top of her small frame.

He leaned into her, placing his head on her chest as their lips broke again and she noticed his increased heartbeat throbbing like a steadfast machine deep in his chest. Cameron ran her right hand along his face, tracing the scar that ran down to his chin before turning and planting a series of small kisses on his cheek. She couldn't remember being this way before, or feeling like she currently felt; not even when she had pleaded for him not to kill her those many years ago on his birthday. Yelling that she loved him now seemed so inconsequential to the present.

"This isn't the way we normally wait for pizza," John said quietly.

Cameron searched for a response to say but found herself still searching for words to describe anything to him. She leaned in closely and whispered in his ear, "I don't care."

They remained in an unmoving position on the couch while minutes ticked away around them, small shifts in their arms and legs every few minutes the only movements that their bodies made. Cameron wanted to speak to him but still found herself coming short of words the more and more she urged herself to speak. Her jaw opened only to lay her warm breath in the form of a moan on his neck, ushering more kisses.

One of John's hands moved down and slid under her back, massaging the metallic spine nestled beneath her skin. Jolts of electricity surged throughout her, overflowing her HUD and causing her to moan into his neck again. The information tingled her body causing her to writhe underneath him as it washed over her like waves breaking on a beach.

John opened his eyes and looked down at her, "You okay?"

"Yes," Cameron purred when she was able to reclaim control over herself.

"You're shaking," John said, a slight grin on his face.

"I..." her throat caught itself again. "I'm nervous," she completed the sentence, shocking herself as she did.

"Oh," John pulled his hand from behind her and brought it up to steady himself as he continued to hover over her.

She turned her head, resting her cheek against his wrist that lay next to her, "I said I'm nervous...don't stop..."

Cameron moved his hand behind her again while her other hand moved over the muscles tensing across his chest. She stared at him lingering above her as the strange electric sensation began to spread through her again. Control seemed to slip away from her as it began to grow more and more until even the image of him hovering over her began to blur and fade into bursts of information.

John's body clenched from supporting his weight with only one arm and perspiration began to glisten across his brow. The added warmth was enough to entice Cameron's fingers to continue exploring as they moved to his neck, snaking their way around then down to his shoulders. She let go of her body again as another powerful wave swept through her, this surge more intense then the last causing her involuntarily writhe underneath him.

John shifted his weight and laid down next to her propping himself up with an elbow while watching her slowly regain a hold of her body. "Sorry, needed to move," He explained, slowly rubbing the scar above his appendix with his right hand.

"It's okay," Cameron replied, not moving as the knock from the door called out to both of them.

"Anybody home? I have a delivery," the man's voice came through the door and filled the air inside the duplex.

John sighed and pulled himself from her side on the couch and made his way lazily toward the door. "Shit," his hands searched his pockets before turning back to her, "Do you have the cash?"

"No, John," she teased while siting up and pulling a ten-dollar bill from her pocket, "We're going to kill him because I can't afford the pizza."

"I'll be sure to let him know of his eminent death," John quipped while taking the ten from her fingers.

She watched him answer the door before turning and walking into the kitchen, taking down two glasses and filling them with coke from the fridge. As she turned to make her way into the dinning room her eye caught sight of the calendar hanging on the wall in her peripheral view. It had been awhile since she had last given the item any attention but the current date made various pieces of information flood her HUD, temporarily blinding her until she suppressed them and continued walking towards the door. She paused again momentarily to look at the monthly time-table, black X's marked out the previous days with the current date, the 25th, encircled. Cameron set the glasses down on the counter and walked over to the calendar, tearing it from its place on the wall and discarding it into the trash bin.

John was seated at the dinning table, much to her surprise, and waiting for her as she walked out of the kitchen. He was gleaming with a smirk on his face that made him look more cheerful then she had seen him in a long time.

"It was messy," John continued to joke, "but I went with dismemberment. He's stuffed next to the computers in your room."

Cameron eyed him as she set the glass down next to his plate, "So he's bleeding all over my stuff."

John opened his mouth to reply but filled it with a slice of pizza before he could say anything, his mind coming up empty with things to say to her. Cameron's lips formed a wry grin of her own before placing a slice of pizza on her plate. She nibbled at the piece of food while stealing glances at John, who was already fast at work on his fourth slice.

"So..uh," he raised his eyebrows, hoping she could pick up on his gesture.

"Yes?" Cameron remained reserved in her seat, waiting for him to talk.

"How about that weather, eh?" John changed the subject. His eyes flew down to his plate as his stomach groaned from being filled with so much food in such a little amount of time.

Cameron frowned at him, "The weather is cloudy."

"The weatherman is unsure if things are going to clear up," he teased, picking up another slice hesitantly. "I mean, things are certainly favorable..."

"John, I..." she started.

"It's okay," he held his hand up to stop her, "I'm just having fun watching you squirm for a change."

"We all need to have fun," she said halfheartedly, taking her plate and raising from the table. Cameron meant to walk to the kitchen but surprised herself when she opened her eyes and found herself to be climbing the stairs with her glass and plate still in hand.

"Hey," John said, shuffling from his seat and standing at the bottom landing of the stairs. "Cam? Everything okay?"

Cameron halted on the second stair from the top, pivoting on her heel to face him, "I don't know whats going on." Her eyes were scanning anything and everything in front of her to keep herself busy. It was as if she couldn't get enough of filling her mind with useless information.

"What do you think is happening?" John asked, propping himself on the banister and watching her carefully.

"I think I need some time alone to design the software for the computer," she said, turning away from him and continuing to walk towards her room.

"Okay..." John let out a sigh and returned to the dinning room to clean up after the one-sided feast.

He heard Cameron return from upstairs and disappear into the duplex next door, closing the door behind her before he could catch a glimpse of her. John picked up the empty box of pizza and walked into the kitchen to throw it away but stopped himself when he saw the calendar hanging halfway out of the bin. He set the box down on the counter, taking the calendar out and looking at the rip at the top from where it had been torn from the wall.

"The hell..." John asked himself, running his thumb and index finger over the tear.

John sat leaned against the counter and studied the dates on the calendar again, wondering to himself what cause Cameron to rip it from its nail in the wall. Nothing seemed to be out of place, unless it was something he did when they were...

He let out a dry cough and pushed himself up from the counter before turning around and digging through one of the utility drawers with his free hand. It took a moment but he finally found a roll of scotch-tape and he tore an adequate piece from the roll. John pressed the calendar to the wall, letting the tape bind well with the materials before withdrawing his hand and looking one last time at the dates on the paper.

The sharpie lay on the counter where he had placed it yesterday after scratching out the day with a large black X, and he retrieved it uncapping the tip as he did. He was just about to cross out the day when his eye flew to the date to the right of his hand, the 26th. John hated social studies in school growing up above all other subjects, not that he disliked it. It had to do with already having everything drilled into his head by his mother when he was still too young to ever have been enrolled in a school. One of the dates she had drilled into his mind was April 26, 1986 citing a significant event in human history, as what she had called it.

"Oh..." the conclusion finally hit John, "So that's why she's feeling down..."

"The program is ready for uploading into the hardware," came Cameron's faint voice from the door of the kitchen.

She was looking at him but seemed to be staring straight through his body and looking intently at something beyond even the horizon. John set the sharpie down and turned towards her.

"Its sucks knowing everything that is going to happen, not being able to do anything about it," he said softly, walking over and taking her hand with a squeeze.

She nodded quietly with a halfhearted smile.

"Its like a personal hell. Been living in mine since 1985...the first 1985..not the one we went back to...if that makes sense," he seemed to question his own logic as Cameron watched him.

She chuckled at his attempt at humor, "I understand...what do you...did you do to get over everything?"

"Tell myself that when I'm able to, I would prevent such things from happening again," he replied.

"I debated about doing something," Cameron pipped up, "a month or so ago when I first remembered, I was tempted to do something and alert them. To try and prevent it."

"Seems like the best thing to do at the time doesn't it?" he asked her, waiting for a reply.

Cameron let go of his hand and walked over to the sink, looking out through the window situated over it. The sun was still shining down on the city but she filtered the light out, letting her see the constellations of the stars above.

"Until you think of the benefits of letting it happen," she said faintly.

"Cruel isn't it," John rested his hand on her shoulder, rubbing it gently, "picking the lesser of two evils."

"I think I finally understand," Cameron replied, laying her hand on top of his.

"Understand what?" John moved himself to her side, watching her study the landscape outside like it was a picture in a museum.

"Why you always hated becoming what you were born to be," her eyes turned and looked at him as the clock on the wall struck at half-past two in the afternoon.

John's eyes wandered over to it and watched as he turned back to Cameron, who stood beside him and slowly nodded in confirmation.

"Care for a drink?" he offered, pulling a bottle of liquor from the overheard cupboard.

"A toast," Cameron corrected as he poured the amber liquid into two glasses and handed her one.

"Toasting to shitty decisions?" John quirked, raising his glass and tapping it with Cameron's.

"To humanity, and the sacrifices that come along the way," Cameron said, tilting her head back and downing the contents of the glass in one gulp.

John raised his glass again in agreement before downing his share of the burning liquid. He didn't feel like remembering...or reliving the events that were going to be sprawled across the various news outlets for the next few days or weeks. Having knowledge of a catastrophe like Chernobyl before it happened was bad enough without having to constantly remind yourself about inaction whenever you turned on the news.

"Another?" he offered to Cameron while pouring himself another full shot. She nodded and accepted the glass as they again silently toasted in the sterile calm of the kitchen.

* * *

This new portion of the chapter was so short I decided to merge chapters 18 and 19 into one chapter as they are about the same length as an average one.

To Be Continued...


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19**

* * *

**Duplex Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**April 25, 1986**

**3:00 PM**

* * *

John had been waiting for this moment for what felt like forever. When Cameron had finally told him that everything was ready to go he could barely contain himself from running to the second duplex and plugging in the chip himself. The alcohol they had shared earlier was buzzing his brain and turning his face a tinge of red as they made their way into the other duplex's living room which doubled as Cameron's computer base. He watched as she took the chip from her jeans pocket and stared at it for a moment before turning and booting up the equipment.

"Ready?" Cameron turned her head to watch John nod in reply.

Her thumb hovered over the chip for a moment before she pushed it into the custom slot on the motherboard, connecting them. They both watched with the utmost anticipation as lines and lines of coding began to fill the screen while the software began reading information stored on the device. Line after line scrawled across at almost lightening speed, far too fast for John to read but Cameron's hawk-like eyes kept a close watch on the information pouring out in front of her.

"Can you make anything out?" John asked, taking a step back and letting her handle the monumental task of translating everything on the screen.

Cameron's eyes danced back and forth along the screen with each new line of code, "Yes."

"Well?" he asked, leaning in closely again but still failing to decipher anything.

"It's a sentence, it just keeps repeating itself over and over...there's nothing else on the chip at all," Cameron replied, tearing her eyes from the screen. His face told her volumes that neither he nor she understood the sentence at all, "It says, 'Of all creatures that breathe and move upon the Earth, nothing is bred that is weaker than man'. Do you know what it means?" she asked in vein.

"Sounds familiar, actually..." John searched his mind, trying to remember just where he had heard that before, "I've heard it...read it before, I just can't put my finger on it. I think my mom read it to me once..."

Cameron hunched over in her chair slightly and turned back to the computer screen, watching the sentence continue to repeat itself over and over again. John stood by her but his mind was a thousand miles away, trying to remember anything about the message. He took a few steps back and began pacing across the room in from of her with his arms crossed, lost deep in thought.

While he continued to wear down the floor with his movements, Cameron unplugged the chip and placed it inside of a crude mesh box she had made. It was made of a metallic material that she had soldered together from various scrap wires laying around after her project of building the computer had been completed. The box was just large enough to accommodate the chip as it sat nestled on top of a piece of cardboard inside. Cameron leaned over and disconnected the power cord to the computer and connected a small wire running from the metallic box to an electrical outlet, sending static electricity to the wire surrounding the chip.

_Nice to know some things work as planned,_ she told herself as she turned and faced John who was still pacing a few steps away from her.

"John?" Cameron asked.

"Yea?" he replied after a few seconds pause, he stopped pacing and walked back over to her, casting a weary glance at the chip sitting inside of the electrified box. "Do I want to know?"

"Its a Faraday Cage, designed to prevent transmissions coming from an electronic device or protect them from outside electrical charges," she stated, casting a glance down at the chip inside of the wire mesh.

"I'm assuming its for the former?" John chuckled and took a knee to get a better look at the mesh she had crafted.

Cameron nodded, "Did you figure it out?"

"I think...its part of a poem," he replied, "I can't remember who said it, but I think its part of the Odyssey."

John stopped his pacing and exited the room suddenly, leaving a surprised Cameron seated in her place in front of the powered down computer. He made his way to the bookshelf in the living room that the previous owners had kept but didn't find what he was looking for. There were a few thick books littering the shelves but all of them were large manuals on various hankerings that one could do with a farming vehicle, much to John's annoyance.

_They really went all out with the rustic vibe,_ John thought as he stopped browsing the books and turned to see Cameron standing in the doorway.

"It's okay, John," said Cameron, looking skeptical of her words even as she spoke them.

"That was supposed to be the big break," he seethed, "turns out we had it all this time for nothing."

"It wasn't all for nothing," said Cameron, taking a few steps towards him, "We know that he was anticipating for some if not all of the devices to be stolen, so he made a fail-safe message for us to find. I half expected as much."

Her eyes floated down to the floor as she curled her toes and took her mind off of the chip while John still looked around the room for something to be mad at. He didn't understand her reasoning and how she could be calm towards the events that had transpired. John caught view of someone walking outside and his first instinct was to open the front door and let them have it for traipsing past his home. They were all out there, walking around oblivious to what was going on and happy to be so, it infuriated him.

John looked up at Cameron again. His anger subsided at the sight of her making small circles on the floor with her toes, she at least looked as if she were accepting of the blow. She wasn't even paying attention to the several locks of hair covering her eyes that preventing her from seeing surely anything through them at all. He could barely make out a smile through her bangs which quickly turned into a semi-frown as she made another small circle with her left foot.

"You said you anticipated it being a hoax?" John asked a little more calmly then he had been a few moments before.

"I wasn't expecting it," Cameron looked up from the floor to face him, brushing her hair from her face as she did, "but I understood that it was a possibility."

"What?" John's brow furrowed as he asked, "How...what does that even mean?"

"It's not always convenient when you think out everything that is a possibility," she put an index finger to her right temple and tapped where her chip was located.

"So what was with the cage?" John asked. "I mean...if he were...if you were him, and you had planned this to happen...what would be your next move?"

"Its hard to say, he knows as much as I do, and can anticipate what I would do just as much as I can anticipate his movements," replied Cameron. "It would be like asking him and I to sit down and play chess, then have me tell you how he or I plan to win before even making our first move."

"Give me a shot in the dark?" John threw his hands up and plopped down on the couch.

"I would have hidden a signal in the chips to activate and relay itself back to me whenever it was plugged in and given a charge of electricity," Cameron said, taking a seat next to him. "But again, that is why I built the Faraday Cage and also just a random guess. It doesn't mean that he did that, he could have not put a signal device in the chip because he anticipated me finding it."

"So he could know where we are, right now," John's head fell onto the back of the couch as he let out a sigh, "So...moving time again?"

Cameron laid her head back on the couch and looked up at the ceiling, "No need to."

John rolled his eyes before turning and giving her a look, "Anticipating?"

"If he _does_ have coordinates to where we live he will do research," replied Cameron, turning and looking at John with a wry grin, "We're nothing if not methodical. Even if he tries to outwit me, he's going to fall flat in a few places."

"And you know this for certain?" John found her hand in his as he asked his question.

"_If_ he knows that someone activated a chip here he will be looking for proof of residence, somewhere. When he searches he is going to find two people registered to this address with the first names, Cameron and John." Cameron rattled off the information in her head before taking a breath to relax.

John mulled over the information for a minute before responding with, "So he's going to come here and you're giving off this _don't-worry-about-it _vibe_..._I fail to see the master plan in that picture, Cam."

"He's going to come to this address _if_ he thinks someone is here, but nobody is registered to the duplex next door," her grin increased slightly as she gave his hand a small squeeze.

"Cam," John quipped, "I don't mean to rain on the way you play chess, but this guy can smash through walls...So unless you're planning on electrocuting this entire side of the house..."

"Have you ventured upstairs next-door?" Cameron cut him off with a dry tone to see him shake his head in reply, "There's a safe room upstairs, with twelve-inches of reinforced steel separating us from him."

John was about to protest to the prospect of being trapped in a metallic cage while a metallic death-machine with full capabilities of breaking in lay outside, but he closed his mouth and laid his head back against the couch again. It was too simple, even for her and he knew that. She had something else planned, even if she wouldn't fully admit it to him.

"I need a beer," said John. He stood and turned to her, "You care for one?"

"No, thanks," she replied with a smile.

* * *

It wasn't easy for him to do so but John let his mind calm in the following days after their failure with the chip. Even Cameron, along with the visiting Kyle, Sarah, and the illusive Claire seemed to be in good spirits when they dropped in to catch up on things in their duplex. They all pushed the idea of the chip from their minds while they spoke over dinners and weapons training for Sarah and Claire. Cameron had taken a particular interest to Claire when she visited, even though it was at a much more sporadic interval then Sarah and Kyle.

Bits of news started trickling into the ears of the occupants in the house; tales of random burglaries, robberies of a few business's, and the Chernobyl disaster which had finally become a staple of the international news junction. Cameron kept her eyes open for anything in their immediate vicinity every night before retiring to a final check of the perimeter before joining John in his bedroom. Every night when she crawled into bed next to him she stressed that nothing of interest had happened, which drove him insane for a moment before his mind calmed from her company.

"Claire is going to be staying here for a couple days," she said sleepily one night, "I need to talk to her about a few things." John was about to ask her what she was speaking of before she dozed off, leaving him alone to his thoughts.

It was the maddening part of everyday nothingness that John truly loathed above everything else, complete silence even when in the presence of others. He tried to imagine the way Cameron dealt with everything on a moment-by-moment basis, which did little to help, but gave him something to preoccupy himself with before his thoughts wandered back to Stark. On more then one occasion he found himself leaving the bed and wandering around the house with his pistol in hand for protection, not that he was looking for something to spend some ammunition on but felt compelled to move about and not sit still.

With so much time on his hands to think about things the month of May came and brought a dryer and even warmer weather to the mid-west region. It also brought with it Claire's two-day visit with them. John was actually looking forward to it, much to his own surprise, and helped Cameron break down her computer equipment and stored it in a spare bedroom of the adjoining duplex. The air inside the place seemed to brighten up the day that she arrived, further cheering him up from his stupor.

Most of the first day was spent getting her situated into John's bedroom which he had graciously donated to her and sitting through an abnormally chatty dinner. It seemed as if Cameron and Claire touched on nearly every topic that came to their attention..._everything_. John excused himself from the table and put his dishes in the dishwasher while the two girls continued chatting away. He had never given it much thought, mostly due to the fact that his mother was the epitome of _the strong silent type_, but it seemed odd how women could talk about so many things for hours on end.

"Gonna hit the hay," he peered through the door and spoke in a hushed manner, hoping he wouldn't be drawn into another conversation about survival in the future.

Much to his delight they both nodded separately and continued with their survival discussion, leaving him to himself as he climbed the stairs eagerly. John climbed into the waterbed and let his muscles go lax as the water rippled under him. His mind started wandering again but he forced himself to empty his thoughts and focus on the cool water of the bed. It wasn't long before he was drifting to sleep, and he didn't even notice when Cameron entered the room.

She heard the slight snoozes coming from his side of the bed and gently closed the door behind her. She watched John for a few moments before being satisfied that she hadn't woken him and turned to remove her clothes before pulling on one of his over-large shirts and crawling into bed next to him. The water beneath her gave away her presence as John's snores slowly died away and he mumbled her name in his sleep.

She didn't respond, hoping not only that he would fall back into his dreams but that she would join him shortly. It had been a long day of conversing with Claire and furthering her weapons knowledge, leaving her tired and yearning for sleep. Her wishes came true as John's heartbeat slowed itself and his slight snores resumed themselves. Cameron laid her arm across his chest, resting her hand above his heart as she too drifted off to sleep.

* * *

Cameron sat up in the bed, running her hand over the area where John's body had been only to find it empty. She cast a confused look around the room but found it too, to be empty. As soon as her feet connected with the floor she knew that she was in a dream. It was the strangely weird but familiar feeling that alerted her to this and gave everything away, a feeling of what she could only describe as an out-of-body-experience. Her dreams always felt as if she were experiencing them but at the same time she was removed from the events that were happening, as if someone were controlling her or her body operated on an autopilot function while she merely observed from inside herself.

"John?" she heard herself call out as she rose from the bed.

She heard nor received a reply as her body clothed itself and exited the bedroom. On her way to the landing of the stairs she noted the pitch-black nature of everything outside the hallway window, nothing existed where the world should have been...everything was black. Cameron watched herself descend the stairs to find Claire and John happily chatting away over a cup of coffee at the dinner table. She watched them for a moment at the base of the stairs before deciding that she herself would like a cup and walked towards the kitchen.

But when she entered the kitchen she didn't make her way to the coffee pot like she predicted she would have, her hands instead stretched out and opened the backdoor of the duplex. The blackness outside grew like a fog as it began to waft its way inside the home until a foot materialized from the base of the fog and planted itself firmly on the kitchen floor.

"John! Claire!," Cameron called out, "Panic!"

Cameron turned to see John and Claire understandingly nod while they turned and calmly made their way to the door leading that connected them with the other duplex. They disappeared inside the door, making their way to the panic room upstairs, while the foot grew into a leg and then another leg came from the fog. She walked over to the kitchen sink and pulled a shotgun from the taped position under the cabinet before turning to face Stark who was standing in the kitchen a mere five-feet from her...

* * *

John gave a loud snore next to her, waking Cameron from her dream and finding herself gripping a pistol that was supposed to be hidden behind the headboard of the bed. She moved her hand away from John's chest and set the gun down on the floor next to the bed with a mixture of curiosity and worry. Never before had she moved, to her knowledge, while sleeping and she had certainly never picked up a weapon and pointed it at John while he slept. She pushed the thoughts aside and reminded herself to deal with them in three hours when she finished her debugging program after sleeping and returned to her peaceful position next to John.

The kitchen and living room were empty when she reached them the next morning. Cameron made her way back up to the upstairs bathroom she shared with John. She undressed and entered the shower, letting the warm water run over her body; it felt...good...if that was the word to describe the sensation. Her thoughts began to drift away with the water circling the drain as she sat down in the tub while placing her head in the path of the falling water. She slowly closed her eyes and fell asleep in the warm embrace offered to her by the hot shower.

* * *

She was standing in the living room of their first safe house in 2009, everything littering the room exactly like she remembered it. Cameron's hands were clutching a pistol as she watched herself move into the kitchen and opened the door to walk outside. Her long and slender fingers were pale white in stark contrast to the black grip of the pistol. The door opened by means unknown to her as she turned and went through the threshold and seeing Claire and John standing in the small front yard waiting for her by the swing-set.

"You shouldn't be out here in the open," said Cameron, her tone was very flat and almost mechanical as she spoke.

"Cam, come on! It's only five minutes of fresh air," beckoned John with a wave of his hand. He tried to usher her over to the swing-set with he and Claire but Cameron remained firmly planted halfway out of the door.

"Come on, Cameron. Don't be such a Debbie-downer!," said Sarah, taking a stand with John.

Sarah calmly walked over to Cameron and placed her hand around the barrel of the gun. Cameron reluctantly gave the gun to her and watched her study it by turning it over and over again. Sarah seemed fascinated by the desert eagle even though she had already held it countless times during their firearms training together.

"You're a master of knowledge. Tell me, what happens when two objects of the same make occupy the same space at the same time?" Sarah asked suddenly, with all the emotionality removed from her voice. Her eyes were piercing towards Cameron with a deadly intent.

Without warning nor waiting for Cameron to reply, Sarah raised the heavy firearm and released a shot squarely in-between Cameron's eyes. The last thing she saw was John, standing complacently behind Sarah, as everything dimmed when her head hit the ground.

* * *

Cameron's arms snatched the shower curtain down along with the rod which, until now, had been securely fastened to the wall with large screws. Everything was still returning to normal in front of her eyes and at first she did not know where she was nor how she had came to be there; she was convinced that something had happened, something or someone had taken her there after Sarah had pulled the trigger. It all seemed so real...

"Cam?" John called from behind the closed door, "Cam? Everything alright?"

She could hear the tense nature of his tone and tried to form words but found herself unable to do so. The water in the shower had turned cold and was now spilling out onto the bathroom tile floor along with the crumpled shower curtain. The water seemed to shock her further, not letting her speak...as if the cold were tightening around her vocal cords, if she possessed them to begin with.

"Cam, open the door!" John pounded on the wooden frame again and turned the doorknob in vein, "Come on, Cam!"

Cameron tried again to form a response but found herself still unable to speak. Her hands and legs were trembling from the cold of the shower, which she didn't even think was possible. She tried one more time to say something to John but only managed a faint, "Uhhnff."

Without another word from outside she heard John slam against the door, splintering it in half and breaking it from its hinges. Her body seemed to go limp in the tub as he clambered over the two-halves of the door to kneel by her side.

"Hey, hey, hey," John said quickly, "Cam. Cam?!"

Cameron's head rolled to the side, absent her control, and she looked up at his face. Her eyes saw the worry in his as he kept trying to wake her up and get a response. Claire appeared in the doorway with a look of shock, her hands covered her mouth while she squealed at the sight of Cameron's body laying in the tub.

"Claire, go get...just go okay?" John stressed as he let Cameron's head down gently to free his hand. He turned off the water still spraying down on both of them and looked back at her face, still unable to see a response from her.

"What the hell, John," Claire stammered.

"Just take the car and get out of here, okay. Don't ask questions, just go!" barked John.

Cameron watched as Claire tearfully turned from the door and ran down the hall towards the stairs. She wanted to scold John, to tell him not to yell at the young girl but she still found herself unable to move or speak. It was as if she were in a dream and unable to control herself while condemned to watch her body carry out trivial actions, but she knew this was not a dream.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20**

* * *

**Duplex Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 11, 1986**

**9:30 AM**

* * *

Claire waited until the sun rose above the buildings the next day before moving from the front seat of her car. The rays creeping in-between the buildings brightened everything up about the world around her but her mind was still lingering on the ill thoughts of the previous day. She sat there through the night strumming her fingers on the car-wheel waiting on the courage to come for her to open the door and walk back into the duplex, but she always fell short.

Months ago she would never have thought of herself being in this situation but time had eased the wounds, causing the rift between her and the others to shrink. She had most of that to thank from Cameron, who had been not only extremely helpful in those past months but also a surprising friend. There was still something that the machine wasn't telling her but for now she didn't mind that so much, in time she was sure that Cameron would tell her everything when she was ready.

Her mind began to tempt her to open the door again before she stopped herself for the hundredth time. Part of the reason she had yet to move was from fear of what had happened the previous day but also came from not knowing what she would do once she was actually inside the house again. This wasn't the first time that Cameron had been incapacitated in front of her but when it had happened before she hadn't seemed so...dead. In the past she may have been unable to move but she had still been able to communicate after powering on, or what John called 'rebooting'. Yesterday had been different. Yesterday Cameron was still very much alive but had the appearance of someone who had just passed away. It made the image in Claire's mind of the limp body in the shower all the more striking and unforgettable.

The other reason she hadn't budged from the car was John. During the time she had spent at the house he seemed his to be his normal avoid-everyone-but-still-be-in-contact-with-them self, but at the same time he was much more abrasive then normal. There were times that she had caught him staring off into space and talking to himself, and that was something she had never seen him do before. For her this trip needed to work in bringing them together, Claire had been almost willed the rift between the closed if it hadn't been for Cameron helping as well. She still got the feeling though that no matter how much she talked to him that John was still just as distant to her as he had ever been, which made the ideal of sitting put in the car much more appealing.

The last thing she wanted to do was buck up enough courage to enter the house only to be ushered out by him again. John had that way of exuding a scary demeanor, at least in her eyes, without him being aware of it. Even when he wasn't trying to be scary and he was talking to Cameron and laughing, Claire still found small mannerisms of his to be creepy. The fact that he was not aware of these traits made him much more intimidating for her; all she would have to do is open the door and she would probably feel the sense of unwelcome in the air.

With a final self-scorning, Claire opened the door and began to step outside when she saw John exiting the front door of the duplex. He was walking in long and steadfast strides towards her car, like a man on a mission...and she was the target. Her right hand rested on the keys sitting in the ignition chamber and waited for a sign to crank the engine.

"I thought I asked you to leave," he said, taking the final steps and coming to a halt outside of her door.

_Tell him, just tell him_, she told herself. "I have just enough reason to be here as you do..."

"Well not anymore..." John said vaguely, his eyes looked out over the roof of her car for a moment before refocusing on her.

"The hell are you talking about?" Claire's hands retreated from the keys and rested in her lap.

John tried to form words but found himself unable to speak and merely shook his head slowly in response to her question.

"What...do you mean. I mean is she?" Claire asked, laying her left hand on his.

"Yea...she is," John finally said, clearing his throat and turning back towards the house. "Look I'm heading out of here by the end of the day, you need to figure out what you need to do. Whatever is out there besides Stark is smart its going to know we were here at one point, and when it does it is going to strike hard. You don't want to be around here when it does, its not pretty."

"John...I...I..." Claire stuttered. "Where are you headed?"

John turned around to face her again, "I think its best if we don't say, in case one of the four of us is captured. We won't be able to give up the others that way."

Claire nodded uncomfortably, "Well I have no idea where to go." She stared out at the road in front of her and thought about leaving everything and running like they had done in the past. It wasn't a great life but it did at least keep you alive.

John leaned in towards the window, "Well alright, how about you just worry about tonight, okay? When you leave here I need you to drive and pick a street that heads out of town. Stay on that road for at least three cities until you stop. In the third town, drive around for an hour or two down as many streets as you can; then find a motel and get a room. Give me a call here, I should still be around until midnight or so."

Claire went over the directions in her head again and nodded along after he asked if she understood everything. "I think I got it," she said.

"Good, now get out of here will ya. I have lots of packing to do," John said with a wave as he walked back to the front door of the house.

He walked inside the front door and closed it behind him, not looking back at Claire who finally started her engine and pulled away from her spot outside. John walked to the door and took one step inside the house then stopped himself and took two steps at a side-strafe. He kept his eyes straight ahead as he took one step back then another two steps to his right, coming to a stop on the side of the couch.

John climbed over the arm on the couch and strode across the cushions to the other end. The couch looked like an utter mess as he climbed over the other arm and stood on the floor next to it. He allowed himself to smirk before walking the two steps forward and opening the door to the adjoining duplex. He took the long walk up the stairs and entered the room on the right and came to a stop at the foot of the bed where Cameron was laying.

"Did she leave?" Cameron asked through a tightly clenched jaw, still unable to move most of her body.

John walked over to her side and nodded slowly while taking her hand in his, "Yea."

"We need to pack up and leave," Cameron replied.

"I'm tired of running though," John said, "And I'm starting to think you are too."

* * *

Claire continued driving like John had told her and by dusk had finally booked a room in a small motel outside of Provo, Utah. She took her bag of clothes inside with her and locked the door. Her eyes peeped through the peep-hole in the door and checked for signs of anyone following her but she found none.

Claire started unpacking the lone bag she had taken from her car filled with a ll the essentials; a change of clothes, toothbrush, hair dye, scissors, and the extra fake identity that Cameron had given her. She laid them all out on the bed evenly and looked over them carefully. Her hands retrieved the extra change of clothes and the hair dye and she made her way to the bathroom.

The hot water steamed up the room in no time as she waited patiently beside the shower, letting the dye in her hair do its job. She gave one last look at the box and noted the time requirements for the procedure before tossing it aside and hopping under the jets of water. Trickles of reddish tint washed from her shoulders to her feet and finally began circling the drain as the water continued to pour down on her. Claire picked up the bar of soap from her bag and began to lather up her body. She let the water soothe the aches of the long car-ride away as it washed the soapy mixture down the drain.

After what felt like forever, she turned the water off and pulled herself a towel from the counter-top. _I wish it had went better,_ she told herself as she ran the towel over her hair, _I __needed__ it to go better._

Claire wrapped the damp towel around her body and walked in front of the mirror, letting herself get adjusted to the red hue now dominating her scalp. She let out a slow sigh and walked back into the main room, gathering up her jeans from the bed. Her hands searched through the pockets until she found the folded up piece of paper she had been searching for. Claire gave one last look at the locked front door before making her way over to the phone sitting on the nightstand in-between the two beds in the room.

She picked up the receiver and put it to her ear, resting it between her head and shoulders while her fingers searched for the piece of paper in her jacket pocket. They finally grabbed hold of the paper and pulled it out. Claire took a moment and studied both pieces of paper in her hands, they both looked the same but she knew they weren't. Her eyes cast a heavy glance over each before she tossed the one from her jeans aside and unfolded the slip of paper from her jacket.

On the torn paper was a scribbled down phone number. Claire dialed the numbers and waited for it to ring while she re-folded the paper and placed it back into her jacket pocket. She caught one more look of the piece of paper laying on the bed that had come from her jeans when a voice finally came through on the other end of the phone.

"Yes?" the voice was soft spoken, but firm in tone. It sounded monotone with very little emotion, which sent a chill down Claire's spine.

"I want to hear them," replied Claire.

"The address first, as a sign of good faith," came the voice on the other end of the phone.

"Let me hear them, or nothing," Claire hissed. A look of seething anger went through her as she waited to hear the voices on the phone.

"Hello? Claire?...CLAIRE?" came a man's voice, followed shortly by a woman crying her name.

"Mom! Dad!" The look of absolute hatred melted away into a look of fear as Claire cried into the phone but only heard the voice in reply.

"The address," the woman stressed, "or they die."

"Don't! Just..." stammered Claire, "2875 Sycamore Drive. Cedar City, Utah." She paused a moment before adding, "Please! Don't hurt them!"

"That depends entirely on you," replied the voice before hanging up the phone.

Claire's hand was shaking as she let the phone click down on the receiver. She looked again at the slip of paper holding John's phone number on the bed before picking it up and dialing the number immediately.

_Come on, come on...Pick up, dammit!_

* * *

The phone receiver came to a rest on the hilt as she hung-up the phone. A woman stood in front of a very distressed looking room with a slight smile on her face. She was medium height with a slender frame, though her military clothing covered her figure well. Her long blonde hair was pulled up and stuck into a bun that protruded out from under her hat. Her piercing blue eyes darted around the messy room and picked out a path across it, making her way long the path until she came to a halt in the doorway of the adjoining room.

_Too bad,_ she thought as her eyes scanned the wreckage, _all for nothing._ They had gotten what they'd came for after all.

She turned the corner and entered the room to see the large figure of a man slamming the two owners of the house against the wall with incredible force. As they recoiled from the blow he pulled a slick and chromed pistol from his waistband and put two shots into each of their skulls before turning around and waiting on her to say something.

"We have a long drive ahead of us," she told him, turning without another word and making her way to the front door. The woman stopped in the doorway and turned to face the man standing over the two bodies, "Leave no traces, we exit in five."

"Affirmative," replied Stark. His HUD display flashed with the message: Target Acquired...Target Acquired.

* * *

To Be Continued...

sorry for the short chapter, I had writers block for the past two weeks.


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

* * *

**Duplex Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 11, 1986**

**8:30 PM**

* * *

"John, I wish you would go now," stressed Cameron through her clenched jaw.

It was nearing twilight outside and the last rays of the sun were beginning to hide behind the buildings as night slowly laid claim to the Earth. Cameron lay in her fixed position on the bed and slowly watched the light fade from the ceiling and trace its way down the walls until they would disappear. They were supposed to be leaving the house that evening, far earlier then what John was designating as their departure time.

"Not a chance, still got something I need to do," said John with a slight pep in his voice. He was hunched over something on the dresser by the bed having been working on it for the past hour. "Besides, I couldn't leave you here all alone now could I?"

He reached down by his side and picked up a flat-head screwdriver and started tinkering with whatever was on the dresser again.

"John, you need to get out of here now. The phone has been ringing every few minutes for the past twelve hours, why haven't you answered it? It could be Sarah, or Claire, or Kyle," Cameron said, hearing the tension and stress rise in her voice as she did so.

"Cam, I'll go when its time okay..." sighed John. "And either way, you'll be coming with me when I do."

Cameron dropped the subject and resumed her medial task of staring at the ceiling while he continued to pour himself into whatever was on the dresser. After some time she looked over at him and he had gone without her noticing. She supposed he was off packing bags again but the sound of a car door outside and the shuffling of feet in their duplex next door let her know that something was up.

John came back into the room a few minutes later when the car-door outside opened again and the vehicle had driven off.

_Must have been Kyle and Sarah,_ she thought as she looked him over upon entering the room.

"Aren't we leaving yet?" asked Cam, feeling stressed to the max, as John sat down on the bed next to her and began testing her arms and fingers for movement.

"What do you think about not running," he asked her calmly as he sat her left arm down, looking a little disappointed from the lack of motion she could exude.

Cameron thought about the duplex for a moment, even with all of the fortifications and precautions she had added to it after they had moved in. She knew it was not built nor intended as a place of defense and should probably never be used in such a manner, but they had used worse in the past and prevailed. All of the materials in the wall stood little chance against the brute force of a T-888 like Stark, all he would have to do is assess the wall layout for a few moments and he could topple the entire second floor down on John.

"John we shouldn't..."

He handed her a small black box device and gave her a look of satisfaction. Cameron tried her best to move her fingers around the device so she could map it visually in her mind but the most she managed to do was give her index finger a slight bump across the face of the box.

"It's a trigger," John said calmly, bringing it up with her hand so that she could see it.

Cameron flashed a look towards him that let him know to stop with the explanation, "I figured as much, but to what?"

"I need you to trust me, when the time comes I need you to just press that button," he replied, not breaking his eye contact with her.

"John Connor," she said, willing her arm to grab him and pull him in close but it never moved.

"Uh...Cam, John is fine," he joked, laying down next to her on the bed and positioning his arm behind her neck. "Reminds me of mom when you do that, just don't okay."

"And?" asked Cameron, "What happened to no more secrets?"

John noticed Cameron closing her eyes when he moved his arm causing her head to turn towards him. John winced as she continued to keep her eyes closed as he ran his hand across her cheek, tucking the locks of hair in front of her eyes behind her ear.

"I took some precautions to give us time for a fighting chance _if_ it is indeed Stark that is coming," said John, and smiled as Cameron opened her eyes to see him, "you didn't think I was going into something blind and with no even-chances did you?...that wouldn't be possible, especially against an infiltrator."

"I'm not questioning your logic, John. And I'm certainly confident in your abilities in warfare, but you've always had help. You would be going up against whatever is coming through the door alone, and I would prefer we leave before that happens," she replied.

"That seems a little two-sided don't you think?" John asked, "You say you have faith in me but want us to leave anyway."

Cameron studied John's face for a moment as he slowly turned it away from her and looked up towards the ceiling, realizing that she didn't have a say in the matter.

"I didn't...I...I don't know how to say this," she said softly.

John turned his head back towards her and spoke just as softly to her, "Cam, it's okay. Just tell me."

"I don't know what to do when your gone," she said, "I don't know what _I_ would do if you were gone." Cameron corrected herself, "Gone.._gone."_

A slow pause and silence filled the air between them after she spoke until John stroked her cheek again and gave her a wry-grin.

"I'm not going anywhere...besides, there's like what...a one-in-a-million chance that Stark is actually coming here?" chuckled John.

"You predicted Claire...you predicted that months ago," she spoke. "What if you're right about this too?"

"Because I don't see things working out any other way. There are other avenues that events could take, but from what you've taught me about infiltrator actions this would be the most logical thing for it to do," replied John.

Cameron remembered months back just before she left to track Stark by herself that John was having reservations about Claire. He had sat her down and they had both discussed her dynamic within their group, both of them agreed rather reluctantly that she was the weakest link. He had predicted that it was a possibility that Stark or someone else involved would use someone or something close to her to motivate her actions against them. It had been the whole reason for her trip to their duplex, to strengthen the bond between herself, John, and Claire to prevent that from happening.

"Sucks doesn't it," asked John. He shifted his weight over onto his side and locked eyes with her, "Treating people like they are chess pieces."

"Mmm" Cameron replied, hating the thought of what Claire had been up to for the past few months while she had been protecting her.

"Took me awhile to grasp that concept too. Always thought there was another way to deal with things," John said, taking his eyes off her and focusing on the ceiling again, "always told myself _One life is worth the same as a thousand_ and _I'd never leave anyone behind_, but the truth is eventually I would have to come to terms with not being able to save everyone. That is trying to act like a hero, and heroes are nothing more then people who get lots of others killed."

"John..." Cameron started but she stopped as he continued.

"When you stop paying attention to saving everyone you start looking at the endgame, and that is enough to drive someone mad over the course of a lifetime. Everything else is just a trivial hurt, or an eventual accident waiting to happen," he said coldly, "It sucks when you go to memorials for the fallen and grieve with the living, knowing that they carry little more significance then scurrying insects under the foot of an adolescent boy."

"Ellison..." began Cameron in a halfhearted voice.

"...was a friend," said John indifferently, "But he was doomed like we all are. We all are going to lose the battle of life eventually, the only thing I see as a fitting solution is finding something or someone worth fighting for."

Cameron watched John speaking in front of her. Some of the words coming from him reminded her coldly of the distant military leader that she knew from her original time-line. The man that would sacrifice entire squads of soldiers to further the battle against Skynet. It was something that she wasn't used to hearing from him in a long time, and something that she had hoped he wouldn't talk about ever again.

"James and the others were flawless in their service, but...I don't mean to sound cynical," John spoke for the first time in a tone that made her half-believe the words coming from him, "eventually we all die. They died for a cause and way of life, they got it easy."

"I get it," Cameron said suddenly, surprising herself as she did so. "Removing yourself from the equation, so you better the odds of victory."

John nodded reluctantly.

"He did that," she continued, not surprised when a scowl crossed John's face, "he did that well, John. People admired him, they thought of him as a God. But what nobody else saw was the man that functioned behind the mask that he wore and they all saw. They didn't see the fear, the paranoia, the constant anger, or the depression. I did, and that is something I don't want happening to you again."

"He was constantly afraid of making the wrong decision, not because of if it saved or ended lives but because the wrong decision would mean Skynet won. He was paranoid of those around him, constantly having everyone checked to make sure they weren't an infiltrator when they returned from a field mission. They always assumed it was a routine physical for readiness or just what happens to those in the service, but I knew the truth of why they were checked out. The slightest thing would set him off into a rage that nobody could calm him from, and people died because he was in a mood. And the depression was the worst thing to watch him go through, he was alienated from everyone but couldn't do anything to fix his standing with those who began to see through the cracks of his mask. He was trapped inside of his own shell with only one cause driving him, the war."

"Inherently there is a singular problem with isolation," continued Cameron, "removing yourself keeps you from feeling anything for anyone eventually. I don't want to see you get lost in that feeling, not like he did."

John hesitated for a moment before speaking, "How did he deal with everything?"

"The best he knew how," Cameron replied. "He poured himself into strategies with me and then relayed them to others under his command. He picked the small victories and let them add up over time to an eventual victory, but he lost himself in the process. By the time I was sent back he was on the verge of psychosis. I don't think it was long after that event that others would begin to see the real him too."

"Why did he send you back?" John asked, watching her as it seemed that she struggled to find an answer.

"I don't know, I have my suspicions," she said in reply. "There had been hushed whispers amongst a few members of the inner circle. I think he sent me back to protect me from being discovered."

"Why didn't you ever tell me about this before?" John inquired, "I mean, when Judgment Day happened. It would have been useful to know how I acted at that time. I could have used the information to fight them."

_"Them_?" Cameron stressed, "I'm more then a repository for information that garbles it out when you ask."

It took a moment for John to realize what he had said and he urgently tried to correct himself, "_them_ I meant, Skynet. The machines."

"I know what you meant," Cameron cut him off, "I don't think of myself as a Skynet manufactured-being anymore. And I didn't tell you because you didn't need to know."

"That is a little unscrupulous don't you think?" John countered, "Withholding stuff that could effect myself but allowing me to carry on anyway."

"You have free will, as do I," Cameron stated, "How would you go about telling Sarah about her problems? Would you have told her about her mental breakdowns when it came to a new computer factory being started? Did you tell her about her obsessions over the three dots? Or the Kaliba Corporation?"

"No," she continued, "you realized how things would affect her and tried to steer her down another course. One that you hoped would be better for her in the future."

"Oh?" John quirked an eyebrow as she spoke, "You think that is the same? Cam, my mom isn't the person that had to lead a global assault on an enemy that you can't kill."

"It is exactly the same," she replied, catching a lump in her throat as she spoke.

"I didn't tell mom because she didn't need to know that," John said, hearing and realizing his poor choice of words even as he spoke them.

"She didn't need to know? That is vital information about her well-being," Cameron iterated.

"I didn't tell her because..." John started

"Because I love you," she cut him off, letting the words sink in as she said them. "I didn't want nor want to see you become _him. _I love _you _not him."

Her ears perked up to the sounds down on the street below them and she locked eyes with John, "It's time."

John flung himself up from the bed and scooped his arms under her body, picking her up and carrying her towards the door and wrenching it open with his foot. He carried her across the hall to the bedroom with the panic-room located within and deposited her inside of the steel door. She watched him stand up and move toward the large metal door, beginning to close it behind him.

"Let me see that finger," John motioned toward her hand holding the black box and she was finally able to have her thumb move over the button, "Good. Listen in and when I tell you, hit that button."

Without another word between them he closed the door and left her in the dimly lit room. She jacked up the audio receptors in her ears but found John's footsteps on the stairs to be very muddled at best, in the midst of a battle between him and Stark she wouldn't be able to hear a thing.

"John," she said through her clenched jaw, but she was sure her frail voice would barely carry over to the other side of the room never-mind through the thick steel and walls that separated them.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**

* * *

**Duplex Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 11, 1986**

**9:17 PM**

* * *

"Who's there?" John asked, keeping his distance from the front door while training the desert eagle with a deadly grip. He remained inhumanly still and quiet in the dark house as he waited for a response.

Much like before, nobody responded to his call outside the home and he was left to the silence of the night. There was a slight rustling of leaves that stirred as the breeze blew outside but that was the only noise he could hear. The adrenaline pumping through his veins made him want to jump outside the door to see who was playing mind games but he restrained himself and repeated his question again.

John had no idea what or whoever lay outside had planned or when they would strike, but he ran over his own plan again in his head to check everything one final time. He heard the creak of a windowsill opening on the other side of the living room a mere ten or so feet from him and his curiosity got the better of him. John turned to look and saw the window slowly rising though he couldn't see the person raising it. His finger removed itself from the trigger of the handgun and he withdrew into the dark shadows of the house and remained hidden in the corner next to the front door where he would be obscure from the figures view.

The figure entered through the window very quietly, had John not already been aware of its presence he was sure he would have not heard it at all. He made sure to keep control of his breathing to remain hidden while the figure hunched over and crept into the dinning room about fifteen feet in front of him. The darkness in the home made it difficult to make out any features of the figure but he did see a ski-mask trying desperately to conceal large locks of blonde hair.

_Its definitely not Stark,_ John thought to himself as his right hand slipped into his pants pocket and retrieved a small remote control. His finger moved over the number-one button and the tape recorder he had hidden on the top shelf of the bookcase in the living room activated, playing back messages he had recorded earlier.

"This is John Connor," his voice came from the recorder.

John watched curiously as the figure stopped dead in its tracks, but instead of turning instantly and firing in the direction of his voice it slowly turned and walked toward the bookshelf. He continued waiting until it had stepped within five paces of the tape recorder when he hit the second button on the remote.

"You just don't understand, do you?" came his voice from atop the refrigerator in the kitchen.

Again the figure stopped dead and turned slowly towards the sound of his voice. It seemed to know it was being watched and tried to hide the fact that its presence had been noticed by being as quiet as possible. The figure was halfway into the dinning room and on its way to the kitchen when John took the tape recorder from his jacket pocket and hit the play button on the top of the device. He tossed the recorder a few feet away having it land on the couch a few feet away from him and he waited patiently for the message to begin playing back.

"I've been waiting for this moment for an eternity, you know?" his voice echoed in the house, causing the figure to turn again and softly begin moving toward the couch. "You just don't understand do you?"

John put his knuckles to the hardwood floor and very deftly knocked out the morse-code for S.O.S. Just as the figure reached the couch. He watched and waited but the surprise from Cameron didn't come. Knocking again on the floor, John waited again but still had no response from Cam in the safe-room.

_Plan B then,_ he told himself as he stood, still remaining hidden in the shadows of the night.

The figure had just picked up the tape recorder when he aimed the gun at the figures head and spoke in an authoritative tone, "Are you armed?"

Freezing instantly at the sound of his real voice, the figure dropped the tape recorder on the couch and raised its hand to surrender. John repeated his question and a shake of the head came in reply as he followed with, "Take off the mask."

The hands of the figure rose and removed the thick black mask covering its head but it still remained obscured in the shadows, much to John's annoyance.

"Is Stark here? Is _it_ outside waiting?" John barked, still not moving from his position in the shadows near the door.

This time the figure nodded in reply and took one step to the right, trying to walk around the couch that separated them, "There is no time to talk," spoke a quivering female voice.

The voice was familiar to John, having felt that he had heard it before but it had been years since it last passed into his ears, "Identify yourself."

"Is this him?" came the voice as the figure remained still.

"It may or may not be," spoke John, he took a step from the corner into the moonlight coming through the front window so that whoever standing in front of him could see the gun in his hands. "Who's asking?"

"I need to speak to John Connor," said the woman standing in front of him, she took another step to the side and was clear of the couch. Nothing but open space lay between them now.

"Sorry to disappoint," John replied, "He's not here right now, but I have this and you're standing in my way. So I'm going to ask you one more time, identify yourself."

"You can't shoot me," said the woman with a little bit of confidence in her voice, "If you shoot me it'll bring _his_ attention, and we both don't want that to happen."

"Yea?" scoffed John, "what makes you think I can't take him down after you?"

"The other one is here isn't it?" asked the voice, but continued before John could answer, "I'm guessing that it isn't, otherwise you wouldn't be here. You would be hiding behind it, having it point the gun at the person trying to help you."

"If you know he's out there then you're with him," John retorted, "What is he doing? Waiting for a signal? What does it want with John?" John's eyes flew over the figures shoulders to check that the windows were still closed and the door in the kitchen remained locked before returning his glare to the woman in from of him.

"I told you, there's no time to talk," said the woman, "You need to listen to me, now!"

"Do I now?" John sneered, still not lowering his weapon at all.

"He's served his purpose, and I've served mine," the woman spat out, "its time for Connor to take over now."

"What?" John asked, genuinely thrown off his game, "Take over what?"

"He told me you would understand, he said you knew about things, he..."

John cut her off with a quick reply, "I don't know who you're talking about. We am _not_ working with Stark. Who the hell are you? Another hireling of his sent in here to distract me or something?"

The woman made a small step forward and stepped past the arm-rest of the couch, letting the moonlight strike her face and John finally getting a look at her face. His mind put two-and-two together when he saw her, knowing that he had recognized her voice from long ago...

"Riley?" John asked, not believing the words as he spoke them.

"Who are you?," Riley asked, waiting for a response impatiently, "Who are you, and how do you know my name? Can you get in contact with Connor quick?"

John nodded, "Reese. Kyle Reese, its a time thing, I've met you before and yea I can. What the hell are you doing here?"

"John Henry told me you were all aware, he told me you knew," Riley said, "I followed his plan, and its time for you to take over now," she said half-frantically.

"John Henry," John hissed through his teeth, _I'm going to kill him._ "What the hell are you talking about."

"He sent me back, gave me a plan," Riley started getting visibly nervous when John didn't lower his gun, making her speak in-between gasps of air, "Said I had to activate the metal and it would follow its own protocol...said it would start trying to rebuild Skynet...and I should let it...then when the time came...that...that Connor was supposed to take over...that he would know what to do."

"The fuck are you talking about, Riley?" John eased his stance with the gun but still kept it trained on her.

"I was supposed to play along and help it out, then when the time came I was to let you guys take over..."

"TAKE OVER WHAT!?" John yelled, raising the weapon again.

"I don't know, I don't know," Riley cowered a little when he raised the gun again, "He told me you would know what to do."

She waited for him to interrogate her again but he remained speechless in front of her, so she decided to get him back on track, "Look I've wasted enough time, you need to get whatever you need to and take him down." Riley nodded towards the door, "Third car down, pale blue Crown Victoria."

John gave a quick look at the door before turning around and flashing her a sympathetic look, "Sorry, I can't take that chance."

He stomped on the floor three times and finally got the response he was looking for from Cameron. Riley's body went through an uncontrollable spasm as voltage passed from the floorboards via wires he had rigged. She made several incomprehensible sounds before falling to the floor like a limp piece of cloth, foaming at the mouth.

"Unless you want me to have it turned on again, you better start talking," John knelt down over her and brushed the blonde hair back with the barrel of his gun so it no longer obscured her face.

"Hon...Hong...Kuh...K..K.k..Kong...f...fuh..financ es...in...Hong Kong..." Riley said between the spasms still running through her body.

"Is everything you've already told me true?" he asked calmly. He waited and received a furious nod in reply, "Good, good."

"I'm going to leave you here, you should be able to walk in an hour or so," John pulled her back into the epicenter of his electrical trap and positioned her body to make it seem as if she had been caught without his help. "He should come in to investigate pretty soon. When or if he does, you tell him that we weren't here do you understand?"

Riley nodded in reply as John continued, "In the copy of Moby Dick on the bookshelf is a postal address, when he comes and gets you; you are to acquire it without him seeing you and contact me via the address discretely. Somewhere in the letter make a reference to Avila Beach so I know its you and not him. Oh," John knelt back down beside her, "and try to figure out what the fuck you just got yourself zapped for, because I sure as hell don't know."

He looked down at her as he stood up as another shock-wave rippled through her limbs, "Nice to see you again, Riley."

John concealed the gun in his waistband after flicking on the safety and bounded through the door and up the stairs to the safe-room where Cameron remained seated. As the door opened he panted and tried to recover his breath as he grabbed a duffel-bag full of supplies from the room.

"Did you get him," came her faint voice to his ears.

"Not quite," John huffed as he opened the rear window in the bedroom outside the metal room and chucked the duffel-bag down onto the ground below. "I'll explain when we're out of here," John came back and picked her up.

As John took his first step out of the room with Cameron in his arms heard Cameron whisper, "Freeze."

All of the joints in his body obeyed and completely went rigid as Cameron's audio receptors picked up the sounds of heavy footsteps downstairs followed by gasps of a woman talking. Cameron's hand squeezed the device again, causing Riley downstairs to cry out in pain as she was electrocuted again along with Stark hovering over her.

"Cam, let go of it," John didn't wait for her to comply and knocked the device out of her hand. "Come on, we gotta get movin."

Cameron looked at him confusedly and stopped him from moving by grabbing his hand and squeezing with almost enough pressure to break every bone in his hand, "What happened down there?" She waited for the sound of a loud thud before letting go of John's hand.

"_I don't have time to tell you,_" John grunted from the pain in his hand, "If you don't let go I'm going to toss you out the window and get you out of here the hard way."

"Fine," Cameron replied and released her grip on his hand.

Cameron studied his face quizically while he ran down the stairs and out of the adjoining door. Her eyes caught a glimpse of Stark laying motionless next to a young blonde-haired woman dressed in all black with blood flowing from her ears and nose. John kicked open the front-door and jogged down the street to the pale blue car that Riley had described, placing Cameron in the passenger seat.

"John," Cameron began before being cut off by his hand as he took his seat behind the wheel.

"No time, got to get out of here," John breathed a lungful of air as he cranked the car and shifted it into drive.

"Who the hell was that, John?" Cameron willed her hand to move the shifter from drive to park and for once it replied.

"It was Riley," John blurted out. "Can we go now?"

"No!," Cameron snapped. "Shes stuck in there with him, John!"

"She's _working_ with him!" John pried her hand from the shifter and put it into drive just as Stark emerged from the front door of their duplex and began sprinting towards their car.

"I've got no time to explain," he stressed as he threw the shifter into reverse and slammed his foot onto the gas.

The car roared to life with the pressure of his foot and began rocketing away from Stark, who still continued his inhuman sprint towards them. They pitched to the left as John yanked the wheel around and the car performed a one-eighty before barreling away from Stark. It was only when his body had disappeared in the distance did John finally look over at Cameron with relief.

"She didn't deserve that, John," muttered Cameron with an attitude as she watched the buildings give way to the bare environment outside of the small town.

"She didn't know who I was, we don't have to worry about that," John replied, matching the tone of her voice with his own. "Seems _John Henry_ doesn't know when to quit when he's ahead though. She said _he _sent _her_ back to activate Stark."

"That doesn't make any sense, he had no reason to," retorted Cameron, the anger slowly leaving her voice as she contemplated the information John had divulged.

"I'm not trying to be an ass, alright?," John took his right hand from the steering wheel and laid it on her left thigh, "that is what she told me."

"What _exactly_ did she say?" Cameron asked, she tried to look over at him but her neck would not comply and she was left to watching the road blaze by.

"She said; John Henry sent her back after us, but she didn't say why specifically she was chosen. He gave her a mission to activate Stark and to follow him around as he _followed protocol_ by rebuilding Skynet. That our time had come to take over the mission because she and he had played their parts," John rattled off as they entered the next town, already thirty-or-more miles away from Cedar City.

"Interesting," Cameron said faintly.

"What?!" John asked, perplexed that she was unraveling the mystery behind Henry's actions already. "Please tell me you didn't know anything about this?"

Cameron rolled her eyes and attempted to make eye contact with him again but failed, but her message was well received by him. He turned his head and started driving in silence while she quietly contemplated what had unfolded minutes ago in their home.

"John Henry must have accessed portions of my database while using my chip..." she spoke aloud as she went over the information in her head. "If he did that, then he had access to my data on Stark and his whereabouts. Sending someone back through time would mean his motives for the mission needed to remain a secret, but not a secret large enough that we eventually would not be included in it hence the _taking over_ aspect."

More and more pieces to the puzzle began turning up inside her head as she tried to piece them together bit by bit, "Stark being activated would not send him on a mission of rebuilding Skynet. He would follow protocol by killing Riley and returning to standby mode awaiting the Governor of California's speech in 2009."

"Unless she divulged information to him meant to trigger a response that would ultimately lead him on the path to rebuilding Skynet," Cameron connected another hypothetical piece of information together while John continued driving in silence.

"What would she tell him though, the only thing that would override a mission parameter would be a direct order from Skynet command or the introduction of a higher value target," she continued.

"Like me?" John finally broke her concentration with a question.

"Yes," she replied, "Stark would _not_ return to standby if he was alerted to your presence in this timeline. But simply saying that you existed here would not do. Stark would investigate but unless his search turned up any leads he would dispose of Riley then return to standby."

"The house fire," John added, taking his eyes off the road and glancing over to Cameron whose eyes opened wide.

"He investigated which turned up Claire, who lead him to us..."

"But why didn't he go after me?" John asked.

Cameron looked at him from the corner of her eye, "I don't understand, he did."

"No, he didn't. He waited until _after_ you and I left the house before striking. He attacked Kyle and mom, not your or I," John explained, his grip on the steering wheel increased as he began putting together the puzzle himself.

"She said she knew this whole time but had to play along so that he would not suspect anything," he continued, "Riley said that she knew...she let him nearly kill Kyle just to further her cause."

"You allowed her to be electrocuted and be exposed to possible brain damage or death just to obtain information about Stark and then left her in a room with him," Cameron quipped, cutting him off.

"John Henry wanted Stark to rebuild Skynet in this time, but wanted us to takeover the creation of it before it became what it was _intended_ to become," Cameron said, the last piece of the puzzle fell into place and she looked up from the floorboard of the car to the road in front of her.

"We shouldn't have left the house without..."

"Cam, I already told you, there was no time. He was already activat..."

"I'm not talking about her," Cameron cut him off, "I'm talking about Stark's chip. We shouldn't have left the house without his chip."

"The fuck does his chip have to do with anything, goddamit?" John all but destroyed the wheel with his grip as they came to a halt at a red-light in the town.

"Every chip that Skynet manufactures has source-codes and software to run whatever piece of equipment it is intended for," Cameron explained. "Stark had students experienced in the tech field building primitive chips for him, what if the chip I stole was empty because it hadn't been filled with data yet?"

"They weren't intended for software," John repeated what Cameron had told him after she had first examined the chip in the motel room after she had returned from her six-month absence. "They were intended for storing data."

"Stark was building Skynet, but he would only be able to take it so far with what he knows. Eventually he would have to submit his chip to someone and trust that person to fill in the rest of the data from his chip to create a clone of Skynet," Cameron said in one breath. "Riley said it was time for us to take over, she was talking about his chip. We were supposed to take his chip. If we had his chip we would have final say in what would be included in the software he was developing. I think John Henry meant for us to create an artificial intelligence like him, to prevent anything like Skynet from ever happening."

"Fuck..." John sighed as the light turned green but he continued sitting at a stand-still in the car for a few more seconds before applying pressure to the gas. "She mentioned he had finances in Hong Kong. Do you think that has anything to do with this?"

"Hong Kong could be a destination where he had someone lined up to decipher his chip. They could be included in this on a higher level from the future or they could be blissfully unaware that they were creating a doomsday software," explained Cameron. "Either way it is worth checking out."

"I gave Riley the information on the post-office box we own in Salt Lake City. Within a few days she should contact us if he didn't kill her, maybe we can squeeze a bit more info out of her when she does," John offered a solution as he pulled into the parking area of a large Holiday Inn on the next corner.

"You better hope he didn't," Cameron returned to her disappointed tone.

"Yea...it sucks, doesn't it?" John sneered as he exited the car and made his way to the front lobby to pay for an overnight room.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**

* * *

**Holiday Inn**

**Salt Lake City, Utah**

**May 12, 1986**

**10:09 AM**

* * *

John felt restless trapped inside of the hotel room. It felt like they had wasted their time waiting and would continue to do so until Riley did or did not send her letter. In his eyes they were further from their goal by holing up in a hotel room and doing nothing, though in truth he didn't know what they would do if they traveled to Hong Kong with no information to go on. They would be in the middle of enemy territory without knowing who to turn to or even who to exterminate, and he understood that.

_Smart plan there, John,_ he inwardly mocked himself for booking the room and having the many arguments with Cameron after they had settled in. _Very intuitive thinking. How could I be so fucking stupid..._

"John, you need some rest," said Cameron faintly, her voice already trailing off as she fell asleep.

He didn't answer her as she slipped into her dreams, he would prefer to stay awake at the moment. His eyes were stinging from being awake for the past two days but he only blinked tightly and forced them back open so he could watch the street down below from his perch by the window.

"John," breathed Cameron, "nothing is coming. Lay the hell down will you?"

He cast one last weary look down at the bustling street down below before turning and making his way into the relative darkness of the room. Cameron leaned toward him instinctively as he pulled back the thick covers and climbed in, settling in next to her. She tried to move her body more then it was willing to and finally relented, letting her head sink back down into the soft pillow.

"So," said John, pushing the thick cover aside and maneuvering his way out of the t-shirt he wore, "where are we exactly?"

Cameron didn't respond to his question but looked up at him in a rather bewildered fashion. He seemed to be deep in thought to her as he stared up at the ceiling and wrapped his arm behind her neck. She breathed into his side and finally felt a twitch from her hand as she willed it to move and it responded by laying itself over his heart.

"Are you still pissed because of Riley?" he asked, a rippled chill passed through his chest at the cool touch from her hand.

"I was never pissed," Cameron corrected, her eyes closed but she continued on, "I was disappointed that you chose to act like _him_ instead of you."

"What if we're one-in-the-same?" John asked, sounding judgmental of himself as he spoke. "What if I'm bound to do this more in the future? What then, hmm?"

"Then I'll have to try harder not to be disappointed," Cameron responded. John moved his left hand up to his heart where her hand lay and intertwined his fingers with hers.

He remained silent, the many words passing through his mind to say escaping his voice as he wanted to talk but found himself unable to. He remained laying there next to her as he began to succumb to his aching muscles and burning eyes, finally falling asleep to the sounds of Cameron's light breathing.

* * *

The next few days passed by at a much faster pace then John had been looking forward to. Most of his time had been spent helping Cameron regain mobility in her upper body, though she still had no function in her legs. On the third day he broke into their emergency fund and bought a wheelchair, which enraged her to a point he didn't think possible when she first laid eyes on the contraption, but with the passing of time she grew accustomed to using it.

"Still nothing, eh?" John asked as he put her foot back down into the resting place at the bottom rung of the wheelchair as the therapy session ended on the eighth day.

"Nothing," she reiterated, looking slightly depressed as she willed her toes to wiggle but they remained still.

"I can't figure out what the hell happened," John said with a heavy sigh as he lifted himself up from the floor and flopped onto the bed. "I mean...I've ran through every scenario in my head and nothing make sense."

Cameron remained silent, still trying to will her feet to move but kept receiving the movement of a stone from her lower extremities in response while John continued his train of thought out loud.

"_John_ _Henry_," John sneered at the mention of the AI's name, "built the body for you as an improvement on Skynet's design. Your chip remains original but you've been compensating for all the overloading data you get by purging every night."

"Perhaps nothing can keep up a super-powered facade without eventual damage," Cameron added.

"What?" John asked, miffed by her statement.

"Even the most well designed machine eventually needs maintenance. The human body is well designed, but eventually even it dulls and fades," she explained. "If my body is an improvement and nothing is wrong with it, then the area lies within the chip. Its the one part of me that isn't replaceable and unchangeable. You can't just transfer the data onto another identical chip, it would be like asking to transfer one human brain to another body and expecting that persons identity to remain intact."

"When one thing is changed or altered it affects part of the whole," Cameron continued, "Even if the change is imperceptible, nothing remains the same after part of it has been altered."

"Well maybe we've been going about everything the wrong way," John sat behind her on the bed and laid his hands to rest on her shoulders, "maybe we should be trying mental therapy instead of physical."

Cameron's eyes closed as she exhaled slowly with a smile spreading across her lips. "Sounds like a challenge for another time."

"Not feeling up to it?" He asked, sliding off the bed and kneeling by her side.

"Maybe after some rest," she said, "it might help to try after purging, besides you have mail to check."

"Ah," John chuckled, "always something to get me out of the room these past couple of days."

"You need news from Riley, and I need some sleep," Cameron said, swatting away his offer to help her onto the bed.

Cameron pulled herself up from the wheelchair and straightened out her legs underneath the covers. She laid back into the cool embrace of the soft pillow and mattress as John scoffed and gathered a fresh pair of jeans from the floor and grabbed his car keys.

"I'll be back in an hour or so," he said casually as the door closed behind him and he stepped outside of the hotel room, locking it before departing for the parking lot.

"John?" asked Cameron in a daze as she heard the key enter the lock on the door. "That you?"

"Yea," grunted a muffled voice from behind the door as the person seemed to be struggling with talking.

Cameron grabbed hold of the wheelchair armrest next to the bed and pulled herself into the hated contraption he had purchased for her. It took a moment to balance herself without the use of legs as a support system but she managed to compensate with her arms just fine. With a great push she propelled herself towards the door, navigating around John's discarded clothing and the colossal duffel-bag that lay in front of her.

John stood in the doorway balancing three or four grocery bags in front of her with the key to the room stuck in-between his teeth. She offered to take a bag or two from him but he kept a firm grip on them causing her to lean back in her chair defeated and stare at him curiously.

"Uh?" she looked puzzled, "good news I take it?" She wheeled herself out of the way for him to enter the room and he looked relieved as she ushered him in.

"Yea," he huffed as he shuffled his way into the room, "but that can wait for later. Right now we have something to celebrate..."

He dumped the lighter bags down at the foot of the bed and turned around with a bottle of wine in one hand and a box of small cupcakes in another, "Surprise!"

"John," Cameron closed the door and turned around to face him, "are you sure you're okay?"

"Aww come on," he shrugged and slumped down on the bed, "don't tell me you forgot?"

"That depends on what _it_ is," Cameron allowed herself to chuckle as she wheeled herself to his side. He looked defeated and she only assumed that her lost train-of-thought to his celebration was to blame.

"Today was the day we had put aside for getting everything settled in Baja, before all this stupidity happened," he made motions in the air with his hands as he spoke before setting the box of cupcakes in her lap, "It also just-so-happens to be the day you arrived to search for mom and I back in 1999, and has nothing to do with the fact I've been an ass and trying to make up for it." He looked over at her sheepishly while he finished speaking and gave her a slight smile.

Cameron rolled her eyes at the bottle of wine that he held up in the air and the box of cupcakes in her lap, "Well its a start, I was getting a little hungry too."

"Well its settled then, I'm an ass," he said proudly as he uncorked the bottle of wine and poured them each a glass, "and today shall be celebrated."

"You're not a total ass," she corrected as she tasted the icing from one of the pastries. The saccharine overloaded her palette and caused her jaw to clench. She supposed she must have put on an excellent fish impersonation because John let out a chortle of laughter as her eyes shut tight.

"I have been known to become one on occasion," John said. He handed her a glass of wine while taking a few sips from his own, "I did get the letter from Riley by the way. For now it looks like she's still playing the _I don't know anything_ card, but she gave me an address in Hong Kong to contact."

"I thought that was going to wait until later," Cameron grinned, taking a few sips of her own wine to wash down the incredibly sweet taste from the icing.

"Touche, smarty," teased John. He reached out and took one of the cupcakes in his hand but turned it over and over instead of biting into it. "I _am_ sorry about being an ass."

"I know," Cameron said. "Just try not to let it happen for another six months, you'll be over your quota."

"Deal," John toasted by finally sinking his teeth into the cupcake he had been twirling around in his hands. He remained in silence as Cameron nibbled on a cupcake of her own until he looked up and asked, "So what do you feel up to for today?"

"I really don't know," Cameron said after giving his question some thought before realizing, "I'm happy with this."

"Okay," John chuckled after inhaling another cupcake, "well I'm gonna take a shower, you down?"

"No," Cameron breathed, "I had one after dinner."

"Okay...well um, I'll be out in a few, and when I am we can think of something to do that doesn't involve sitting around and talking about how great times used to be," John rattled off as he got up and rummaged for clean clothes from his duffel-bag. "Makes me think we're some old married couple in their sixties," he gave a fake shudder then headed into the bathroom.

* * *

The steam from the shower was obscuring John's view, along with the towel as he dried his hair, when he stepped out of the bathroom to find the room completely dark. By the door, the large window had been obscured with the thick curtains being drawn to a close, allowing little to no light inside the room. Rays of light peeked from the edges of the window and cast an orange glow toward the bed a few feet in front of him.

"Cam?" John called out, he instinctively reached for the nightstand where his pistol was resting but something caught his hand before he could grab the grip of the gun.

"I'm here," Cameron replied, easing him toward the edge of the bed with her grip.

"Whats with the horror-film vibe going on," John laughed as he let himself be pulled towards the bed. His foot connected with the bottom rung of the large wheel from her wheelchair and he let out a cry of pain for his injured digits. "Ow..fuck...sorry..."

"I thought of something I'd like to do," came her voice from the darkness as her hand reached out and took hold of his again.

"Oh," John said as he realized her message.

* * *

Riley took a few steps toward the vehicle then stopped as the car continued waiting for her on the curbside. Stark was behind the wheel and staring her down with his normal thousand-yard stare, even though it felt like his eyes were boring straight through her rather then focusing on her body. In that instant the thought crossed her mind to run and escape his lunacy but the gun resting on the dashboard above the steering wheel wiped that epiphany from her mind.

She took a few deep breathes before opening the door and getting into the backseat behind him. Riley squirmed uncomfortably in the seat, avoiding eye-contact with him via the rear-view mirror hanging from the windshield, she instead crossed her arms and looked out into the parking lot of the Holiday Inn.

"Was the package received?" asked Stark from the drivers seat. His body and head remained facing forward, almost as if he were ignoring her completely as he asked his question.

"Y-yea," Riley stuttered, "he took it."

"The girl?" Stark asked in a monotone voice, "Was the girl with him?"

"She was waiting," Riley replied.

"Her physical injury is noted. Was there any indication that would lead you to believe he would contact John Connor or the girl?"

"Listen asshole," Riley snapped from the backseat, "I'm not turning them over to you, go stick your dick in an electrical outlet if that's what you're wanting."

"Negative," replied Stark, "Termination will be postponed, you may prove useful in the future."

"The fuck does that mean?" Riley seethed, "I just told you I'm not turning them in."

Stark finally turned his head in her direction and gave her chills from his steel-eyed expression. His voice echoed in its normal monotonous tone which disturbed her to the point of wanting to jump out of the car and see how far she could run before having a bullet pass through her skull.

"Are you aware of James Henry Atkinson," he asked, still keeping his lifeless eyes trained on her.

"Wha...who the fuck is that?" Riley asked, wide-eyed and dumbstruck.

Stark turned and started the car, putting it into drive and pulling out from the Holiday Inn parking lot, "In 1897 James Henry Atkinson invented the spring-loaded mousetrap. The device slams shut in thirty-eight-thousandths of a second. It is a record that has not been beaten, it is hard to devise a quicker acting mechanism."

* * *

To Be Continued...


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**

* * *

**Stark's Stolen Car**

**Salt Lake City, Utah**

**May 20, 1986**

**11:18 PM**

* * *

"So," John said, breaking the silence between them in the car, "how did you like the movie?"

"You were right, there is something about seeing something in the theater," Cameron replied, reliving memories of the past two hours spent with John in the movie theater while he drove them back to the hotel.

The car continued slinking its way through the traffic in the bustling city under John's skillful handling as Cameron leaned her head against the headrest and closed her eyes. They came to a gentle stop at a red light, letting John eyes wander to the seat next to him where he saw Cameron peeking out of the passenger window at the night sky.

"You sure that didn't have anything to do with it being Top Gun? A movie you practically broke the tivo with back in 2008?" John teased as the light in front of them turned green and he responded by rolling through the intersection towards their hotel.

"I like flying," she replied tauntingly, "it had _nothing_ to do with the tivo."

"Well I had a good time regardless," John added as he pulled into a spare parking space. "Think we both could have used some normalcy before flying halfway around the world."

John exited the car and walked around, grabbed the chair for her from the backseat and offered a helping hand as she climbed from the car. He gave a chuckle as she sat down and they set across the nearly empty lot to access the elevators. The ride up was silent as their reflections in the gleaming metal doors stared back at them until they were swept away by the metallic barriers opening. Cameron rolled herself further into the room as John turned and locked their door behind them.

"John," she began but paused before adding, "what do you want?" Cameron wheeled herself against the wall on the other end of the room and turned to face him while waiting for a response.

The question threw him for a loop as he opened his mouth but found no words to respond with. His mind searched for something to say before he came to the realization that he didn't truly know, nobody had asked him that before.

"I...uh," he still tried to grasp the right words to say as he slouched on the bed before laying down with his feet still planted on the floor, "I don't know to be honest, Cam. Sometimes I think about doing stuff, but when it comes down to something...I'm really not sure."

The bed creaked as Cameron's right hand pulled herself up onto it, causing John to sit up and look around wildly for a moment before offering her a helping hand which she shooed away. He held up both his hands in a mock-surrender and laughed as she maneuvered herself up onto the bed beside him.

"Chivalry is nice and all, but there are some things I can do for myself," she explained as he continued to hold his hands in the air.

"I know what you mean. I'll make an effort not to let it happen again," said John in a teasing tone, and nodded understandingly before laying back down on the bed.

Cameron curled up on the bed next to him and pulled the thick covers up over themselves as the temperature continued to drop outside. She leaned in and placed her head on his chest, listening to the wet thumping of his heart and the slow movement of air in his lungs. The sounds were comforting to her ears and she allowed her eyes to close as she continued listening to their rhythm, remaining in the relative darkness of the room with John.

They stayed in their embrace for quite some time as Cameron and he laid there with her while slowly running his hand gently up and down her arm. John wanted to speak, but still found himself at a loss for words. In part, he refrained from speaking from fear of ending the moment they shared together.

He felt a cool hand reach up and begin to trace the muscles on his chest over the shirt we wore. The clock on the nightstand cast a reddish glow over the bed as he took her hand in his. Her hand continued to caress his muscles as his hand moved from rubbing her arm to gently kneading her shoulder.

"Are you falling asleep?" he whispered into her ear after both their hands had slowly faded from moving for quite some time.

"No," came her soft reply to his ears as she moved her left arm up from between them and laid it on his right hand that massaged her shoulder.

"Everything ok?" he asked, taking her hand again and letting his fingers mingle with hers.

"I'm fine," she replied passively, her body turned away from him as she looked up at the ceiling and caught her breath.

"Cam, you're shaking," said John calmly as he pulled her back into him with his arm.

"Oh," Cameron acknowledged, "sorry..."

John moved his arm away from her shoulder and started to change his position when she stopped him, grabbing his hand and putting it back on her shoulder. He paused for a moment before moving it lower down her arm and letting her smooth skin give way under his fingers. Each pass caused a catch in her breath that he took as a sign to continue.

"Please don't stop," she breathed into his neck as her hand came back to a rest on his chest.

John followed her plea and continued massaging her shoulder and arm as he watched her body loosen under his touch. He felt the warmth beginning to rise in her body as her skin shivered underneath his fingertips. The muscles in her upper body tightened then relaxed again as she urged herself closer to his side.

"This is new," came her voice, speaking to herself out loud.

She looked down at his chest and gave another shudder from his massaging hands on her arm. Eventually he moved his hand to her back and made small circles with his fingers against her shoulder-blades and spine, causing a shock to ripple throughout her body uncontrollably. Her muscles tensed from the shock and her fingers dug into his chest as the wave slowly washed away, allowing her to nestle back into John's chest.

Cameron arched her head up towards his and planted a small kiss on his neck before moving slowly down to his collarbone. She placed two soft kisses on his shoulder before stretching up and planting her lips on his, kissing him slowly. Their lips parted for a moment until John craned upwards and returned them to their former embrace.

The lip-lock was broken again as her arm buckled from under her and she fell down onto her side but John was there in an instant, hovering over her in the darkness of the room. Her hands raised and tugged at the shirt between her fingers and his skin. Another twitch ran through her body, causing her to rip the section of cloth she had in her grasp.

"Who needs the shit anyway, right?" John panted as he wrung the shirt from her and threw it across the room.

He lowered himself again and kissed her passionately as her hands slid along his chest and back. John pulled her smaller body up towards his, raising her from the soft mattress and melding their bodies together. Her lips returned to his neck as he reached down and began to lift her already bundled up shirt. The fabric moved up with his hands and they broke their contact as it slipped from her arms before they were in each others embrace again.

Cameron gave into the hug and held him as tightly as she dared, trying not to loose control as her hand ran itself up along his neck and into the long strands of hair on his scalp. Her fingers pulled tautly on his hair before letting go and exploring again.

"If you stop I'll kill you," he breathed into her neck.

She pressed her mouth against his as the room around them seemed to crumble and dissolve into the blackness of the night. All she could feel was him against her, the only sensations were his skin against hers, the only smell filling her nose was the slight perspiration forming on his chest.

"I need a second," came his voice by her side and he let go of her to lean back onto his knees.

Cameron pushed away from him just enough to lock eyes with him, staring into them for an eternity. John turned his head and inhaled slowly for a moment before looking back at her, watching how the moonlight streamed in through the curtains and cast a pale silhouette against the pitch black room.

He moved in closer again as her arms crossed behind her back and unfastened the clasp on her bra, flinging it to the side of the bed just as their lips met again. Her lips tasted sweetly of honey as he pushed into her again, letting her fall gently back into the mattress. Cameron returned his ferocity by pushing up against his lips and running her hands across his chest, causing John to pull away from her and hover above her body.

"That tickles," he explained, as she looked down and saw her fingers tracing the scar from his surgery. His body recoiled again as she touched the indention in his skin, her fingers tracing every inch of the scar before laying her palm flat against his abdomen.

"Better?" she asked, receiving another strong kiss in reply.

John collapsed down into her again, chest to chest as they resumed pawing over each other. His hands roamed over her sides, touching everything as he moved them along. He arched his back to give himself enough space to caress her stomach and chest as her hands took hold of his shoulders and pulled him back down. He plied himself from her grasp and lifted himself up again, straddling her legs as she remained laying on the bed in front of him.

Her hair was rustled and covering part of her face, but he could still make out the small smile forming across her lips as her cheeks began to blush. John's eyes followed her body down to her slender torso to her navel laying just a few inches from where his legs covered her waist. Cameron's hands beckoned him forward and he consented, leaning back down onto her as their skin touched again. She draped her arms around his neck as he pressed into her again breathing into her neck. His arms snaked their way between her back and the mattress, sending chills through her again as he began to massage her spine.

"Ah" she let out in between gasps of air and began to squirm underneath him.

She could feel his chest against hers and the heartbeat within it increase as the gasped for another breathe of air. The muscles underneath the thin layer of skin hardened and relaxed above her causing a slight but tantalizing effect. Her neck craned upwards and laid small kisses on along his jawbone as he continued caressing her back.

John teased her skin with his hands, moving from area to area and never lingering for more then a moment as she continued to writhe under him. He leaned forward and kissed her hair, the aroma of lingering from her shampoo filling his nostrils as he did so. His right hand stroked her spine again from her hips to her neck causing her to completely convulse against him. The blows from her arms, though unintentional, caused great deals of pain to his arms and chest. He could already feel the bruises beginning to form as her body slowly calmed underneath him, allowing him to regain his composure.

"Suh...sensitive there," she gave her breathless explanation as one final ripple coursed through her.

"Where?" he teased, and ran his hand along the lower portion of her spine again, "Here?"

All of the air in her lungs was released at once as her nails dug into his arms to try and steady herself from the wave running through her. Before she had a chance to breath again his lips met hers again and she groaned as her back arched from his touch. The sensation began to dull and fade away along with the grip she placed on his arms.

"Did that feel good?" he asked proudly, grinning as she nodded furiously in response.

In truth it wasn't good as he had asked, the feeling was overwhelming to her. It was all she could do not to let go completely and allow her body to do as it willed. She had felt the small trickling of his perspiration and blood from where her fingers and grabbed onto him during the last wave, and desired not to cause anymore pain if she could help it.

"You ok?" she asked, finally regaining control of her breathing.

She felt John take her hand and lift her up into another hugging embrace before pulling away and gazing into her eyes. His dark brown eyes filled her vision until his lids closed and a tender kiss planted itself on her lips.

John said nothing and stood from the bed, unbuttoning his jeans and letting them fall to the floor before climbing back over her. Cameron followed suit and slid her hands down along her legs, taking her garments with them. Her back met the mattress again as she leaned back and took his hand in hers, easing him forward until their chests touched again. Her lips moved against his until they opened to his dancing tongue, flicking itself against hers. She replied by taking up the dance with her own, gliding against his as they licked back and forth.

His leg slid alongside her the soft and smooth skin of her legs as he readjusted himself. John moved his hands from bearing his weight against the pillows to running themselves along her thighs. He could feel her breasts and chest meld under him as she pushed him up enough to land another kiss against his lips, groaning into his mouth when she did.

It lasted for only a moment before she broke contact with his lips and began kissing everything within her sight. She made her way along his jaw to his ear, nibbling the lobe between her teeth and pulling gently. John growled into her neck as his right hand moved up and kneaded her breasts between his chest and hers. Her body moved slightly underneath him, causing him to catch himself by moving a knee in between her legs for support.

"Yes," she asserted as he opened his mouth to say something.

He slipped his knee back and straddled her again, easing himself down until their moist skin touched each others at the hip. As he withdrew Cameron exhaled slowly and grabbed the pillow nestled next to her head. John paced himself as he eased himself back down into her as she moaned into his ear not to stop.

* * *

...So um, yea.. *cough cough*

To Be Continued...


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25**

* * *

**Holiday Inn**

**Salt Lake City, Utah**

**May 21, 1986**

**7:02 AM**

* * *

"Cam?" came John's voice through the haze of the room.

Her eyes blinked twice then opened to see John hovering over her as she relaxed back into the bed. His eyes were looking her over, they seemed to be searching for something or an indication from her. It took a moment before it registered to her that he had frozen in time, staying still on top of her and unmoving.

_Is something wrong?_ She thought to herself as he brought a hand up from her side and cupped her left cheek.

_That depends,_ came her own voice from across the room in response.

Cameron looked over by the window where the small table was to see herself seated in one chair. It was as if she were looking in a time-reflective mirror, for the person looking back at her was someone she barely recognized. The black pants, combat boots, and purple jacket were all familiar as was the face hidden behind the long brunette strands of hair, but there was something alien about the expression or lack thereof.

_What are you doing here? _She asked, still unable to move from under John as her legs still lacked mobility. She watched as the other Cameron stood from her chair and made her way over to the bed, taking a seat next to both her and John.

_I'm here because you willed me to be,_ the girl explained, running her hand over John's shoulder and examining the glistening sweat between her fingers by rubbing them together.

_You shouldn't be here,_ Cameron urged from under him, _You need to go._

_ Is he really for you? _Asked the girl in a clinical voice. She stood and walked back over to the window, pulling the curtains back and opening the view to thousands of people gawking from outside. _Or is he for all of them?_

Her hands flew to the sheets down by her waist as Cameron tried to cover themselves up from the many onlookers now pouring their gaze in through the window. Their chants and cries filled her ears as they repeated John's name in sporadic intervals while banging furiously on the glass other Cameron continued to stand proudly by the door to the room while watching her other self struggle with the fabrics on the bed.

_He can't be stretched to be both, you need to decide, _the girl said as her fingers reached the lock on the doorknob and twisted it. Before they could react, the door had burst open from the force of the hundreds of onlookers clamoring outside, all of them desperately trying to enter the room.

* * *

The dull padding of rain against the balcony outside was enough to pull Cameron from her dreams as she opened her eyes and squinted at the soft light pouring into the room. Something about the soothing rhythm was enough to make her yearn for more sleep but she rested her head against John's chest again becoming comfortable without drifting off. The many sounds from outside were mixing into the falling water to form a symphony of noise outside their door as John stirred underneath her.

"Oh," he yawned and gave a great stretch before relaxing again, letting his arm come to rest on her shoulder. The cool air caused him to reach down with his free arm and pull the thin sheet up over them along with the thicker comforter from the foot of the bed. "Morning"

"Good morning," she exhaled slowly as the warmth from their bodies began heating the space under the cover. "Sleep well?"

His arm wrapped itself around her slowly and rubbed his eyes in an effort to wake himself up more. She felt him try to shift his weight but his body recoiled from something midway through the movement and he sank back down into the mattress, trying to play it off as a simple stretch.

"Yea, just uh...I'll have to remember to take it easy next time," John coughed, squeezing her closer to him with his sore arm.

"I think I should be the one worried about taking things easy" Cameron jested, tilting her head up from his chest and resting her chin on his pectoral muscle.

"Cam," he said "you were only responding to what I was doing, it's not your fault." He explained further by lifting the sheets up for her to see the bruises running down the lengths of his arms and torso.

"I told you I was sensitive there," She kept an eye on him before tracing a slender finger around one bruise and laying a small kiss in its center.

"Would you have preferred that I stop?" he gave her another squeeze with his arm before attempting to move again. The pain returned but he pushed it to the back of his mind as he climbed from the bed and retrieved a pair of boxers from his duffel-bag.

"Mmm," she purred as her hand took hold of the sheet and pulled it up to cover herself as he turned around, "I don't think so."

"Well now since that is settled, can I get you something?" asked John, kneeling down in front of the mini-fridge in the room and grabbing some orange juice for himself.

"Water," she spoke softly and pulled herself up into a seated position, letting her back rest against the headboard.

John grabbed a glass and filled it from the tap with cool water by the sink next to the bathroom door. He looked up and saw the bruises on his chest and arms painted across his body firsthand in the mirror before him. Dark blue and purple blotches were littered across his abdomen with the edges of the impact areas having burst the tiny red vessels under his skin. Circles of a similar dark tone lay beneath his eyes from his insistence on staying up while Cameron slept to try and recover her motor control functions. The whites of his eyes were so bloodshot he reminded himself of one of the stringent addicts his mom had once dated for a few months to teach him another one of her valuable 'life lessons'.

Cameron remained in the bed under the cover draping down from her shoulders as he rounded the corner from the bathroom door and walked over next to her. She took the glass of water he offered and downed two sips before setting it on the nightstand by her side. Her eyes lingered on John for a moment before closing and letting the feeling of elation comfort her to the point where a smile began to take shape over her lips.

"I don't want to be a buzz-kill," John said softly as his fingers worked themselves up her arm like a spider, "but we really need to get mom and Kyle on board for Hong Kong, maybe even Claire if she can be found in time."

"I know," Cameron replied with her eyes still closed, "Skynet never sleeps..."

John reached her shoulder with his fingers and let them pry away the sheet draping over her body, letting it fall to the side and crumple at her waist. He deftly set his orange juice next to her water on the nightstand and climbed into the bed, taking care not to stress the many bruises on his body as he passed over her and came to a rest by her side. The cover was pulled back up over them by John as Cameron watched him move with curiosity.

"Are we going to be planning everything from the bed now?" Cameron teased as his hand tucked the cover under her arm and passed over her breasts.

"I would think that would be a little distracting," John quipped, "Don't you think?"

"I can think of a few reasons why it would be distracting," she mused, taking another sip of her water from the nightstand.

"Well I needed to get back in the bed anyway," explained John, holding up the phone from the nightstand on his side, "The phones on this side."

Cameron smiled again as his fingers began dialing out the number for one of the safe-houses that Kyle and Sarah knew they were to be staying in. The rings on the phone were drowned out by her processors, not wanting to eavesdrop on the conversation he would be having with them. Instead she decided to fill her time by reaching under the covers and running her hands along the sides of her thighs. Her fingers had barely made contact with her hips when they withdrew from surprise and shock.

_I can feel it,_ she told herself as her fingers made contact with her smooth skin again.

She pried herself upwards from resting on the headboard and ran her hands along her legs until they stopped at her ankles, feeling every sensation along the way. John looked at her curiously as he hung up the phone and dialed the second safe-house number after having no luck with reaching someone at the first. He didn't want to be rude by saying it looked like she were warming up for the ballet by stretching herself out that far so he keep quiet and watched her from the corner of his eye.

Cameron let go of her legs and sat up in the bed again. Her hands rested flat against the mattress as she stared intently down at the two mounds on the other end of the bed under the covers where her feet lay. She heard John click the phone to the receiver again and dial a third number next to her as she closed her eyes and concentrated on the sensations of the cloth on her skin.

For a few moments nothing happened at all until she focused on trying to move the cover instead of her legs. That was when it happened, a small sensation of the cloth moving over her toe. It was small, barely even a twitch, but it was there undoubtedly.

John shot up from the bed next to her with the phone still stuck to his ear until he threw it across the room and smashed it against the wall. He doubled over with an arm flinging to his chest as if he were in pain. In a moment he hurled up the contents of his stomach onto the carpet as Cameron struggled to force her legs to cooperate but they remained just as motionless as they had been for the past few days.

"We've gotta go," John said hurriedly, pulling himself up from the floor and grabbing clothes from his duffel-bag at the window-side table.

Cameron nodded even though he wasn't looking in her direction as she fell from the bed onto the floor in a last ditch effort to get free of the thick covers that tangled her legs. She slammed into the carpet but didn't let that slow her as she began to fumble with her clothes which were discarded next to the bed. With a final hop she slid on her jeans the hurriedly buttoned them before laying down flat and reaching out for the wheelchair by the bathroom door.

John bound around the edge of the bed, scooping her up and clumsily deposited her into the seat of the wheelchair. She didn't object to his treatment for the moment but she reminded herself to mention it in the future.

Before she had a moment to catch her breath they were bounding towards the door and out onto the balcony toward the elevators. John heaved himself over the threshold of the metallic doors and slammed his finger into the bottom-floor button as he panted to regain control over his breath.

"John?" Cameron asked from her seat next to him as the elevator dinged and opened the door again.

"Not now," John said distantly, "Got to get out of here."

He pulled her from the elevator and began sprinting through the cars in the parking lot until they reached theirs. John threw open the passenger door and helped Cameron into it before flattening the wheelchair and quickly putting it into the backseat. His body slid across the hood of the car as he jumped over and unlocked the door for the drivers side position.

"Okay..." Cameron offered faintly as he got in and started the car, "John what's going on."

"Claire answered the phone," he snapped, throwing the car into reverse and peeling out of their space.

For a moment the car sat there and remained motionless, but as he slammed his foot against the gas the car rocketed forward so fast that Cameron was pushed back against the seat with tremendous force. She closed her eyes and turned her face from looking out of the windshield to facing John by her side as they burst out onto the highway in front of the hotel and continued to blast their way towards the city limits.

Cameron did not think she had ever seen John drive so fast nor so dangerously; The car streaked out of the city and gained speed still as it blew down the freeway towards Cedar City a few hundred miles away. Rain pelted the windshield and road around them as they tore through the morning air but the water slipped off of the windshield just as fast as it hit due to the incredible speed John was now driving the car at.

They were a good five or ten miles from Salt Lake City now. Cameron could see the passing natural landmarks and environment scatter past them in a blur. Even her visual aids that increased the capabilities of her ocular sensors had trouble keeping up with everything as it darted past them. Her eyes flew to the speedometer on the dashboard and saw the needle flirt tremendously with the one-hundred-ten miles-per-hour mark before obliterating it and moving onwards towards the one-hundred-twenty mark.

Rained passed and the skies began to clear up as they exited the cover of the storm-cloud. The sky turned to a hazy, dirty blue tint littered with numerous clouds, and soon they blew into another dark rain-cloud as the clear weather subsided. John's hands were tightened so much around the steering wheel that he thought he felt it bending underneath his fingers but he didn't car as he willed the car to go even faster.

_How long had they been gone, and what the fuck was Claire doing there? _His eyes hovered over the clock on the dash before fleeting back up to the road in front of him as they breezed through an intersection in a small town before leaving it behind in the dust, _How much longer till we get there..._

All he knew for sure was that something was up, and if Claire was there it couldn't be good for anyone. If she was willing to give them up to save herself that made her dangerous, and dangerous was something that he wanted to keep away from his mother and Kyle whenever he was able to. _I'll kill her if she did anything to them..._

Onwards they flew through the bleak landscape as Cameron laid her hand on his shoulder. "John, you need to slow down, we're almost there."

"Fuck slowing down," he seethed through his clenched jaw.

"You're not going to be any help to them if you have half the squad cars in the city on your tail," she patted him on the arm again and breathed a sigh of relief as the car began to slow from the dangerously high speed it had been traveling at for more then an hour.

They rolled into the familiar town and John groaned as they followed the rules of the road through the many streets until they came up to the block where the third designated safe-house lay. John parked the car a little way down from the house and unstrapped himself from the seat-belt before Cameron's tight grip dug into his arm.

"I'm coming in there John, you don't know whats waiting for you," She was stern in her expression and voice, never letting up on her grip of his arm.

"Fine," John huffed and ran around the rear of the car to pull her chair from the backseat.

A metallic chink filled the air as he snapped the seat out of its folded position and crashed it to the ground next to her door. He waited as patiently as he could as she slipped from her seat in the car to the waiting apparatus by the car and bounded off toward the safe-house when she had settled in. John ignored the curious look of streetwalkers and neighboring houses as he turned Cameron's chair around and pulled her up the doorsteps to the landing in front of the door in a rush.

"Be ready," he whispered as he tried the doorknob and it turned under his grip.

John let the gun slip from the waistband in his pants into his grip as the door opened, expecting to see something or someone waiting for them in the room but it seemed to be completely empty of life. The light in the house was dim, relying on the already dull light from outside to light up the interior. His fingers ran over the switch next to the door but the bulbs didn't come on as he flicked them into the 'on' position.

"Come on," said John quietly as he took a hesitant step inside the house and checked the corners and exits before motioning for Cameron to halt by his side.

John looked up the stairs but saw nobody at the top of the landing. He pressed himself against the wall with his pistol at the ready as he nodded for Cameron to check out the remainder of the ground floor. "I'll check upstairs," he whispered to her as he began creeping up the stairs step by step. She nodded and withdrew her own pistol from underneath her stationary legs and began rolling towards the living room.

"Let go, John," he whispered to himself as he took another final step and reached the top stair.

Before setting foot on the second floor he halted his approach and turned to check his blind-side but saw it to be empty just like the rest of the house. Very deftly he crept onto the second floor, his eyes swaying from door to door and surveying the area in front of his feet for possible trip wires as he neared the first entry-way. He sucked in a breath of air and turned the doorknob on his left, pushing the door open quietly he moved his gun up in front of him and gave the room inside a look-over which turned out to be just as empty as everything else.

_I don't like this shit,_ he mumbled to himself as he tip-toed back out into the hallway and began creeping towards the next door. His fingers grasped the doorknob and turned it to unlock the door, pushing it ajar he stepped into the room and immediately fell to his knees at the sight before him.

* * *

**Kyle and Sarah's Safe-house**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 21, 1986**

**4 Hours Before**

* * *

"Babe, come on. You know you aren't supposed to be on your feet," Kyle took the gun from her hands and pulled out a chair from under the dinning room table.

"Kyle, I'm fine," Sarah stressed as Kyle ran his hand over her abdomen, "_I'm fine!._"

"Well I don't know how this works, there weren't many babies born in the future," Kyle apologized but still ushered her into sitting in the chair he had offered to her.

"It works, " explained Sarah by holding the barrel of the gun in her hands, "by not getting the person holding the gun angry."

"Yes, ma'am," Kyle saluted mockingly.

A knock on the door greeted both of them surprisingly as Sarah looked up at Kyle to see him just as taken aback as she was. He picked up one of the assembled weapons and a clip from the table and quietly made his way to the front door as Sarah stayed seated in her chair but threw the tablecloth over the weapons in case anyone at the door grew suspicious of the new neighbors on the block having a stockpile of guns out in the open. A call came through the phone and rang through the house but Sarah didn't dare move to answer it, it rang twice before stopping.

Kyle looked through the peep-hole to see a fist connected to a very muscular man come crashing toward him. Without a seconds hesitation he shouted at Sarah, "RUN!" as he flung open the door and cause the man to loose his balance and stumble into the house.

"Sarah, RUN!" Kyle yelled again as he turned his attention to the large intruder who had regained his balance with almost supernatural swiftness. "Ru..gh.."

His third yell was cut off by the mans hand around his throat as he was lifted from the ground. Kyle kicked the man in the torso with all the force he could muster and he fired one round into the Terminator's left eye-socket. It didn't flinch or show any signs of weakness when the goop from the synthetic eye began running down Stark's cheek, revealing the glowing red eye underneath.

Kyle felt incredible pressure being applied to his neck and throat, causing him to stutter for air and kick Stark as hard as he could one last time. The pressure increased as the blood began pooling inside of his head until he felt something pop in the base of his skull, like a rag-doll he was tossed onto the bottom step of the stairs as Stark hovered over him for a moment.

"This one is not John Connor," his voice echoed in the home.

Kyle thought the cyborg was talking to himself until he heard a scream followed swiftly by a suppressed gunshot in the room nearby. He couldn't move but he still willed his body to, Stark having broken his spinal cord from the inhuman grip on his neck. From the corner of his eye Kyle saw a young woman enter the room with a silenced pistol at her side, Sarah's body laying behind her on the floor with a bullet-hole between her eyes.

"This was not the mission," Stark called out to the girl and took a step towards her.

Kyle watched as the girl responded by taking a device from her pocket and pressed a button on the keypad in her hands.

"The mission was a mouse-trap," the girl explained as Stark stopped his approach and arched his head to the left before freezing entirely, the faint smell of electrical fire coming from his scalp. The woman walked over to Stark and firmly pressed her finger into his chest, causing him to fall over behind the couch without even-so-much as a sign of struggle.

"Can you still talk?" the girl asked coldly, somehow managed to sound even more menacing and metallic then any Terminator Kyle had ever heard.

"Gu..ph..." was all he managed to say as she calmly made her way over to him and knelt down over his body.

"Well that's a shame," she stood up and walked over to Sarah's limp body in the kitchen. With a huff the woman threw Sarah's body over her shoulder and proceeded to step over Kyle and make her way up the stairs in the house. She returned a moment later, dragging Kyle up the stairs and into the guest bedroom where she left him next to Sarah.

Kyle peered over the lifeless body next to him as he struggled to tell his body to stand up and kill the bitch but it never responded. He grunted and seethed with anger as she reappeared in the doorway after dragging Stark up the stairs with her. The woman leaned the machine against the wall beside the door with some difficulty but finally managed to keep him standing under his own weight.

"Now, you sit still you," she said to the dead machine absentmindedly as she pulled a shotgun from the hallway and made her way back over to Kyle.

Kyle reeled from the touch of the girls skin on his fingers as she maneuvered the shotgun into his hands and aimed it at Stark's skull. "Careful now," she said almost playfully, "we don't want to miss." With a pull of the trigger a blast rocketed across the room and destroyed the right side of the cyborgs face, along with it the evidence of her tampering with its chip.

The girl looked quite satisfied with herself as she stood and walked back to the doorway, leaving Kyle leaning against the adjacent wall. "Oh, I almost forgot," she told herself calmly as she withdrew the silenced pistol from her waistband and fired two rounds into Kyle's chest. He sat there stammering for air as the sounds of footsteps and a frantic voice came from the next room, calling the attention of the ice-cold woman in front of him.

"You didn't say you had visitors," the girl smirked and took a step out into the hallway, disappearing from Kyle's view. A moment later he heard the door next to the guest bedroom open and a gunshot dart out before Claire could even scream.

Her body was dragged into the room and deposited in a mock execution fashion next to him just like Sarah's was as the woman turned and headed for the door again before stopping, "Oh. If you're able to do anything else then stutter by the time Connor gets here, tell him Riley says hello." Kyle gulped for another breath of air as the taste of copper began filling his mouth, the bedroom door closed softly behind the girl as her footsteps died away on the stairs.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26**

* * *

**Former Safe-House**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 21, 1986**

**9:00 AM**

* * *

"Mom...dad..." John clutched at the gun in his hands while the blank eyes and faces of his family stared back at him from across the room. _Why, _he asked himself, _Why would they do this_

His eyes lingered over Kyle's limp body, then back over to his mother's and Claire's, all of them had fallen down in place like they were waiting to be fired upon. _It makes no sense, they were told to run...they were __trained__ to run. Why would they block themselves off on the second story without a chance of escape?_ There was something odd about the whole room that John couldn't quite put his finger on as his eyes swept over it again.

_The door was shut...why had the door been shut? _John looked over at his fathers body again to notice the awkward position of his head and his neck which had swollen to nearly twice its normal size. _His neck is snapped, why would he be holding a gun if he couldn't lift it? _John eyed the dead cyborg laying face down with half of its face blown off, the eerie lifeless eye looking up at him even though it couldn't possibly be powered on. _They were executed, but why go through the trouble of staging __everything to look fake?_

With more force then he knew he was capable of, John picked himself off the floor and stumbled over to his Kyle's body to confirm his suspicions that his neck had indeed been broken. He took the shotgun from Kyle's cold hands and pumped it once, catching the shell that expended from the barrel and turned the empty casing over in his hand. _This has been modified, and not by us. Its not his gun, who the fuck..._

John saw the blood leaking down from the bullet wounds in his chest but failed to see the pool by either side of Kyle's body. The blood was literally pooling around Claire and Sarah's bodies but the floor under his father remained relatively clean except for one small section of the floorboards under his hand.

He lifted Kyle's hand and saw the black smear of blood that he had been looking for, _Liver shot. He didn't stand a chance, none of them did, and it wasn't the metal, _John turned on his heels to look back at Stark, _He would have fired at either the heart or head. A shot to the liver is a slow death, a Terminator would want quick verification that the target was down...This is a trap..._

"Riley..." John said to himself as a spark of electricity hummed inside the house and all of the lights came on at once. He was temporarily blinded by the bright lights but he still heard Cameron call out to him from downstairs, "John, was that you?"

"No," he yelled down to her while raising back up to his feet. John took a step towards the door and heard the spark of electricity again, but this time it seemed to be coming from the corpse of the dead Terminator at his feet.

"John," came Cameron's voice from downstairs, "We need to go now!"

_I was getting that exact same feeling, Cam,_ John thought as he jumped over the mass of Stark's body and headed for the stairs. He bounded down them at lightening speed to see Cameron waiting for him in the threshold of the front door, "Are they up there?"

"Yep," John panted as she exited the house and made room for him to leave as well, "Claire too...trap..."

As soon as he had stepped outside John heard the sirens in the distance already closing in on their location. Tossing the keys to Cameron he told her, "Go start the car, I'll grab Stark."

"You want to drag him along?" Cameron asked dumbstruck but still wheeled herself towards their car. She threw a look over her shoulder back to him and hoped for him to leave the house alone and run after her to the car.

"You want him found by the police then confiscated by the military for examination?" John returned, he ushered her to keep moving as the sirens grew louder and louder by the second. When she was halfway to the car he turned and opened the door to the house again. _Goddammit,_ he muttered under his breath and he took a step inside.

A shock-wave blasted down through the ceiling of the first floor and sent him flying back into the street out in front of the house. The two-story house was ablaze with smoke and fire as boards began to creak and groan, everything seemed blurry as he picked himself up and nursed the knot forming on the back of his head from the violent contact with the asphalt. Sounds of screeching tires filled his ears as he looked for Cameron but only saw her wheelchair being crushed by a fleeing car. He turned back to the house in front of him as the second story collapsed down onto the first, spilling debris and smoke out into the neighboring yards.

The police sirens rounded the corner and halted just a few feet away from him. They all exited their cars with their weapons drawn as he held up his hands in front of his face to shield himself from the intense heat of the fire. A small mushroom cloud was rising above the area formerly occupied by the house as two officers ran up behind him and flipped him over onto his stomach while yelling for him to remain still as they handcuffed his arms behind his back.

"Don't move, stop resisting, STOP MOVING!," they repeated in intervals while the house continued to burn at their backs.

"Dispatch, suspect in custody. Contact fire and emergency for address..." John heard one of the rookie looking cops squawk into his mic as the two arresting officers pull him up from the pavement and lead him over towards one of the squad cars.

"You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law," the female cop began reciting until John cut her off with, "I understand."

He sat there for the hour or two that it took the officers and fire department to get control of the fire, watching the house burn down until nothing but smoke and glowing embers rose from its remains. It was nearing mid-day when the rain began to pour and he scooted over into the middle of the backseat to get away from the water falling from the sky because one of the officers had left the window cracked open. John looked up to see one of the firefighters take some equipment into the house with him and begin searching the burning ashes before beckoning others over to him by waving his arms wildly in the air.

_And here it is,_ John said to himself as he watched squads of others begin to pour in around the first firefighter and reel back from the sight of Claire and his family's remains. _Well played Riley._

The two officers that had arrested him turned and headed back to their squad car while he continued to watch the scene unfold in front of him through the windshield. "Thanks for the air conditioning," John acknowledged their mistake with the cracked window when they sat down in the front seats.

"Shut it," the man said as he cranked the car and pulled away from the safe-house. "Dispatch, car eighty-seven headed back to the station with suspect in tow."

He passed the mic over to the female officer and she started reciting off other essential information about what John was sure to be the case of their career. His face stayed glued to the front of the car while they cruised to the other side of town and entered the parking spaces in front of the local police station.

After walking through the many shouts, taunts, and treats from the other criminals that were in the precinct he was sitting in a white interrogation room, waiting for someone to enter the room with him. Like any other room that he expected inside of a police station, it was bare minimum right down to the cheap plastic chair he was sitting in. The only thing that looked like it had been made after the 1970's in the room was the two-way mirror in front of him where officers were no doubt discussing amongst themselves the details of the case with other colleagues while he waited patiently.

_Keep a loose posture,_ he told himself, _don't let your eyes linger on one place for too long._ The lessons his mom had taught him when he was young about being a master manipulator started reciting themselves back in his mind in her voice as the door opened and in stepped the male and female officers that had arrested him.

The female remained standing with her arms crossed by the door but the man came up to the table and took a seat across from him. "Do you know what we call people like you?" He stared at John with a blank face and waited for an answer but didn't get one.

"Ghosts," the officer opened the case file in front of him, "and in my experience from working in Reno, ghosts are usually the guilty ones. So you can imagine our surprise when we get a call about two people entering a home and hearing gunfire. Now I'm going to get to these three in a minute," The man took photos of Sarah, Kyle, and Claire's burned bodies out of the folder and pushed them toward John while he kept talking, "but I'm more interested in you."

The man took John's mugshot out of the case file and placed it across from the photos of the burned bodies, "There's no record of you in the system at all. No prints, no social security number, not even a birth record. Must be expensive being a ghost to stay off grid at that much of a level, but then there is this." A photo of an extremely warped but still recognizable half-destroyed chrome skull was placed next to his mugshot as the cop stopped talking and waited for John to respond.

"Whats your name?" John asked, looking up after studying the pictures for a minute.

"Officer Parks," the man responded smugly.

"Mine's John..."

"Smith right?" Parks responded cockily, he threw a look of disbelief at his partner over his shoulder, "you believe this guy?"

"I don't know what to believe," said the tall redhead while she walked two step forward and took a seat next to her partner.

_Hard cop, stupid cop...really..._John's voice told himself as he looked down at the photos and feigned interest in them, still planting seeds in their mind to make him seem innocent.

"Alright wise-ass, here is how it is; We have you at the scene of the crime of three murders with what we can only assume is some weird mechanical torture device and a desert eagle with scratched off serial number, which is illegal by the way," Officer Parks told John as he began sitting up in his chair and leaning forward to give off an imposing persona.

"I'd like a lawyer, Mr. Parks," John said calmly as he lowered his head and returned his gaze back to the floor next to his feet.

"Suits me fine," Parks began trying to hide the anger in his hands when he started snatching up the photos on the table, "you can sit your ass right here until the D.A. Gets here."

* * *

Another two hours passed before he heard footsteps come close to the door and twist the doorknob. He readied himself while the door opened and in walked a muscular police officer that was stationed to guard the door in case he tried to escape. John didn't see the public defender yet but he waited patiently as he heard Officer Parks calmly talking with his attorney outside.

"I'd like a moment or two alone with him to discuss the case," came a woman's voice from a space outside the door that he couldn't see.

_That better not be who I think it is..._

"John Connor," came the familiar voice to his ears as he looked up to see Riley standing in the doorway waiting for him. Her hair was pulled up tight and she wore a business suit but it was her, he had no doubt in his mind.

"You've got to be joking," John scoffed, lowering his hands from the table and sitting them in his lap while he turned his head away from her in disgust.

"A pleasure to finally meet you, when you are not lying and pretending to be Kyle Reese that is." Riley replied. She turned with the smug look of satisfaction across her face and addressed the officer by her side, "That will be all for now, we won't be having any trouble out of him."

"Its not everyday someone meets a convicted murderer being held on _three_ first-degree murder charges," Riley continued talking as the officer stepped outside and closed the door behind him, leaving John and her alone in the bleak interrogation room together.

"Likewise," John quipped, looking up from his hands and returning her ice-cold stare in full force.

An evil and twisted smirk darted across her lips and she took the few remaining steps inside the room to sit down across from him, "It's four by the way."

"Excuse me?" John tilted his head to the side but still kept his eyes locked on her, waiting for her to make a move.

"If I were sitting where you were, it would be four charges. I couldn't let you get an _actual _lawyer now could I?" she answered smugly and opened the folder that had been tucked under her arm out onto the table.

"Did you at least give him the decency of a burial?" John asked, "Or did you blow him up to?"

"Cyanide actually," Riley corrected him, looking up from the case file in front of her. "Works a lot faster then you think it would, especially in such a large dose."

"To what do I owe the pleasure?" John sat up in his chair and leaned towards her, staring intently into her blank and lifeless eyes, "Here to kill me too?"

"That would be too easy but I must say this is an interesting development in the plan. I was hoping you would still be in the house when it blew, four unsolved mysteries wrapped in a pretty little bow to sit on some obsessing officers desk until the end of time," she said quietly, her hand moved to the outer jacket pocket on her left side and withdrew something as she continued talking, "But this is much more interesting, a slow death. Being held accountable for killing your own people at last, its almost poetic. I wanted to make sure you were behaving, you'll get your death in due time."

Her spidery thin fingers were wrapped tightly around something in her left palm as she sat back and crossed her legs, looking completely satisfied with herself as she sat across from him and watched his every move. "Why did you do it?" John asked her as she sat in her seat silently breathing their time away.

"Why did you turn your back on your own people?" he followed up with as he finally blinked for the first time since she had entered the room.

"Do you know what its like?" Riley piped up, showing the first bit of emotion he had seen from her in what felt like a lifetime, "Did you ever know what it was like?"

"You wanted your ass sitting in that chair across from me, get to talking," John asserted, steering the conversation back to where he wanted it to go. "And quit with the fucking games."

"I wanted to see the great and legendary John Connor," Riley explained with a quirk of her eyebrow as she looked him over as he sat there in his handcuffs and jumpsuit, "I wanted to see what he would do, to have an opportunity to destroy your enemy for good."

"So why wake Stark up from his hibernation? I suppose everyone needs a lackey," John said condescendingly as she shifted her weight in the chair and stared back at him.

"The big brute needed to fulfill his part in the plan," said Riley calmly and without an ounce of emotion, "And like I told you before, he had played his part well, but back to you. How do you think they would see you now, everyone cowering behind the shadow of the General as he squandered his time away with another machine? Letting himself get locked up and not doing a thing about it."

"Don't talk about Cameron," John tightened the muscles in his jaw and cracked his knuckles on the table in front of her.

"Those idiots actually listened to _your_ orders back then? I know what it was like to live outside of your shadow, to have to rely on _myself_ to survive. Two years I wasted out in the bleached skulls and chaos..."

"That's rich," John remarked with a sneer.

"Excuse me?"

"I said that's rich coming from you," John repeated. He let her chew on his words as he chose his next few mentally before slowly sitting up and saying, "You say two years, but the war lasted way longer then that, and I wasn't even in charge of anything until a good four years after Judgment Day. So either you're lying about toughing it out all on your own, or something else is hiding under that bitchy exterior."

"They said you were smart you know," Riley raised an impressed eyebrow and commended him after he had finished speaking. "At least they weren't lying about that."

"They," repeated John, analyzing what she had said. "I'm guessing you were too far gone down the rabbit-hole of insanity to stay with anyone in the resistance. Who was it, the gray's?"

"Very good," Riley quirked and leaned toward him with her arms crossed, "But dead wrong at the same time. The grays were a lost cause, I figured that out after running with them for six months and not accomplishing a damn thing."

"Then how did you get back in time," John thought out loud, "unless...ah, you were inside Skynet itself weren't you?"

Riley nodded as her look of satisfaction increased with his discovery, "Did you know that Skynet heard every single transmission you ever made after the Avila Beach excursion? It took time to pick and choose its battles with you, testing you against itself like some long and drawn out game of cat-and-mouse. I prefer a much more...direct approach."

"I figured as much," John admitted with a shrug, "There are only so many radio channels out there that one can choose from, encrypted or not."

"Then you continued giving your broadcasts to what, instill hope to the human race?" Riley mocked him openly and sat back in her chair, "If you wanted to do that you could have surrendered. A lifetime of slavery is better then spending the rest of your days scurrying through irradiated rubble while searching for a rat to eat for dinner."

"There is no slavery with Skynet," spat John angrily, "There is only death as far as it is concerned."

"Maybe that is true and maybe it is not," Riley chuckled, "but perhaps we should focus on the task at hand?"

"Fine," John looked away from her with disgust, "Why are you here?"

"Nice try, subtle," Riley narrowed her gaze and watched him carefully, "Subverting yourself, giving off signals to make someone think their in control, feigning control when need be; you must have had a great teacher."

"Don't push your luck," John glared back at her, sitting up straight again in his chair.

"Well like I said before, I'm here to make sure you are behaving," Riley explained with a grin, "We wouldn't want you getting off free now would we?"

"So you were with Skynet," John broke her train of thought as he spoke his own out loud, "but it didn't send you back here, no it wasn't that advanced yet. So John Henry did help you after all, but with the trickster you are he probably sent you back as soon as you mentioned wanting to help make the world safer by building a better version of himself before everyone got so wired into technology."

"Correct," Riley said as he spoke.

"So the motivations for being here are entirely your own," John spoke out loud, turning the thoughts over in his head while searching for a clue. "You really hated me that much huh? You would risk traveling back in time and starting up a war again just to kill me?"

"I wanted to see who you were, the man behind the mask. The man that nobody else got to see except for your cyber-bimbo, the man who killed the best thing that ever happened to this planet," Riley said calmly. She raised her right hand and began picking at her nails as John watched her.

"And what did you see?"

"An illusion," she said while chewing on one of her nails, "A man who wore his mask so much that he forgot what he was supposed to be. The great tactician who single-handed brought Skynet to its knees. Who would have thought he did nothing more then spend his time with a machine and plan romantic getaways with her while everyone else went about their lives in complete ignorance."

"So you grew angry with me for not doing anything to prevent Skynet' existence," John asked and received a nod in reply, "That's what made you trigger Stark. Not everybody is a completely obsessed lunatic that goes out _looking_ for and _inventing _enemies."

Riley nodded again but stopped him from continuing, "You are getting a little bit ahead of yourself aren't you?"

"Well after hiding under Skynet's skirt for more then three years, I figured it was only a matter of time before you came back to this time and started making backup plans for something for you to do," John explained. "No, no you came here first to study me but to kill me nevertheless. After you were done with your little game you were going to kill who had killed your protector, but I'm guessing that somewhere along the way of creating one of those backup plans that you stumbled onto information about Stark and tracked him down just like Cameron did in the past."

"Also correct," Riley's grin expanded again.

"So in reality, you're nothing more then a homicidal bitch who wants to kill someone," John sneered.

"Don't talk about me like you know me, you don't _know me._" Riley stood up and walked over to the two-way mirror to stare at her own reflection, "But I know you. A spoiled brat who grew up under the protection of his mommy while she filled your head with tales of evil machines and bedtimes stories of a everyday nobody becoming the leader of mankind. I'm guessing that she trained you until you resented her, maybe even running away from her at what age...ten...eleven."

She continued on when John didn't reply, confirming what she was thinking, "But then the momma's boy crept back...no was _forced_ back into her life by something awful. He never wanted to be the great prophetic person she made him out to be so he had her fight his battles for him, growing weaker with each passing day until the end of the world came and he was left unprepared for what came after that. Somehow by the grace of God you gained what little control over the remainder of humanity that populated the Earth and against overwhelming odds managed to annihilate your enemy. But when everyone needed guidance most, you turned and fled like a scolded dog."

"An interesting tale," John sighed, "Where's Cameron?"

"Ah, and the question that has been gnawing at you finally comes to the surface," Riley sat back down in her seat and crossed her legs again, "You know, at first I had qualms about killing Stark he was the only remaining part of Skynet, but eventually a thought dawned on me; If I were to create a better version of Skynet I would need a better template to start things out with."

Riley took her left hand which still kept something wrapped tightly within her fingers and sat it down on the table next to the folder. John watched as she turned her palm up to face the ceiling with Cameron's chip looking up at him. His muscled flinched as he prepared to soar up from the chair and choke her with his handcuffs but Riley took the chip away from his view and placed it back into her jacket pocket.

"Now now," Riley teased as she returned her empty hand back to the table, "What would she think of you murdering someone?"

"I'm not worried about it," John swallowed a gulp of air before leaning in closer to her, "I won't be killing a person, I'll be killing a psychopath."

"Well now that we're not going to be civil," Riley gathered her folder and stood up from the table to look down on John one final time, "After reviewing the shit in here, I don't think anybody is going to have a doubt in their mind that you killed three innocent people after I deliver a guilty verdict to the judge. Who knows, the officers here might just get another anonymous tip as to the missing girls from Los Angeles, one of whom was kidnapped from her home more then a year ago. I'm sure they will be interested to know that an underage girl was taken from her family, then shot and blown up in a house-fire."

"I'll be seeing you," John said, restraining himself from moving from the chair.

"On second thought, here," she withdrew the chip from her jacket pocket and tossed it to John. He caught it in midair as she walked towards the door and knocked for the guard, "Maybe she can keep you company until your execution."

"Whats the matter?" John asked her as he caught the chip in his hands, "Couldn't figure the complexity of her AI out?"

"Stark already had the techs working for him in the schools piece it together randomly. What made you think she was so special, John? She is nothing more then a piece of functioning software which I already have a duplicate of, her hardware from John Henry on the other hand is _very interesting._" Riley said, opening the door and stepping outside to leave him along to his thoughts.

* * *

And here...we...go...


	27. Chapter 27

**Chapter 27**

* * *

**Iron County Jail**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 30, 1986**

**12:27 PM**

* * *

"On your feet," John was told by his mother, she hovered over him in the small jail-cell and stared down into his very core with her hardened eyes. "On your feet!" John woke from his lucid dream and shook off the haze in his mind while sitting up in his bunk. The sleep still lingered in his eyes while an officer approached the cell from down the hall with a set of keys in hand.

"On your feet," said the officer in a booming voice. He took the keys and unlocked the cell door letting it slide to the side as John stood and waited for the inevitable.

It had been an extremely long and somewhat painful stay here in the catacombs of the Iron County jail for John over the past few days. The first had undoubtedly been the worst, they made the mistake of letting him out of his cell for only a moment while they turned his room over to prepare for his arrival. Those few moments were all that had been needed for the inmate in his adjacent cell to grab him while he waited beside the attending officer and stab him through the bars with some crude weapon, apparently word had traveled fast about how their new guy on the block was a kidnapper and murderer of women.

He had been placed on solitary-confinement for the remainder of his time until the trial started and he would be undoubtedly shipped off to the state prison on a possible death sentence. Unlike others in the county system, John had no trouble passing time in the loneliness of his tiny cell. Plans and theories played themselves to the smallest detail when it came to his strategical analysis about Riley. Most of his days and nights were filled with coordinating a new plan and then testing it out in his mind while he listened to album after album of his favorite rock bands from the late 80's and early 90's that he had memorized, they were enough to keep him sane and occupied in those lonely times.

"To whom do I owe the pleasure?" John asked as he stood and held out his hands for the handcuffs to be placed around his wrists. He stood there in a fake-daze while the officer handcuffed him and lead him out of the cell and down the hall to where the interrogation rooms were. _Oh for fuck sake, if she is back here..._he thought as the officer steered him into the room where another older looking officer was already seated at the table.

"Thank you," spoke the man to his younger counterpart before motioning for John to have a seat. "Hello, son."

"Thanks, I guess," John shrugged as he put up his false-bravado and took the seat across from the middle-aged cop. "So what is this? Follow-up interview?"

"Actually I'm wondering if you can help me out with a little problem I'm having. I'm detective Gregg Tallahassee, 3rd Precinct, Reno, Nevada," Gregg explained as John's ears perked up at the mention of his jurisdiction.

"Well, you are a little ways from home aren't you?" John chuckled but kept his eyes and ears open to the man as he opened a case-file and began rifling through pieces of paper.

"Lets see here, uh...ah yes. Miss Claire Summers," Gregg pulled a photo from his folder of Claire from her high-school yearbook and set it on the table in front of John. "Now this young lady was abducted from her home over a year ago. I was the lead investigator on the case, and also these two uh..."

Gregg pulled two more photos from his file of Kyle and Sarah, placing them squarely beside Claire's photo, "Get this. This guy is driven up to a hospital and dropped off with what I'm told is a serious chest-wound by someone matching your description by the nurses on staff at the time. We traced the vehicle that dropped him off back to a house-fire where Miss. Summers was abducted and witnesses claim to remember seeing a young woman by this description also fleeing the scene in the vehicle." His index finger on his right hand now hovered over Sarah's picture as he continued talking.

"Witnesses told me that something bizarre happened that day that I've been trying to wrap my head around since they relayed the info back to me. Now they _claim_," Gregg sat forward in his chair and stared into John's eyes, "that another unidentified young woman and two men moved into this house shortly before the fire occurred. This, Sarah Connor, was reported missing when her roommate, one Ginger Dominez, reported that she didn't come home for two weeks after being out on a date with her boyfriend at the time. This guy is that boyfriend." Gregg pointed back to Kyle's photograph and waited for John to speak.

"I'm assuming that you have something tying me to all of this, because it is one hell of a drive to here from Reno," John said casually as he struck up a gaze with the man seated across from him.

"DNA and eye witnesses," Gregg confirmed, a small smile forming on his mouth as he leaned back and pulled another piece of paper from the file and began reading from it.

"Lemme see here, oh yes this is where things get interesting; Witnesses confirmed that they saw a car screech to a halt while one female occupant ran into the burning house and pulled Miss. Connor and the unidentified male from the building. The female rescuer was so injured by the fire that much of her hair and skin on her face had been burned and singed away, leaving many to see what was described as a glowing eye and gleaming reflective surfaces where bones should be."

"Now...Mr. uh..Smith, is it?" Gregg looked over at John's file to confirm his name but saw it to be blank, "I have two women; one underage and kidnapped while the other just vanished into thin air with her boyfriend, a house-fire which leaves twelve eye-witnesses so shocked that they claimed some _robot_ rescued two injured people from the flames, this unidentified boyfriend being smart enough to evade a police detail on him when he is released from the hospital, then much to my surprise things get even more interesting when all three curious peoples end up in another home together, shot and executed before being blown to kingdom-come."

"Do you want to know what the constant is in this very fucked up equation, Mr. Smith?" Gregg offered a question, intent upon hearing its answer.

"Me," John replied, sitting back in his chair.

"Bingo," Gregg pointed towards John with a smile on his face, "You, Mr. Smith, are in every single detail of the problem I'm having. So, I was hoping you can clear this up for me a little before I add the two charges of kidnapping, transporting a minor across state-lines, and a slew of other laws you've just happened to break while on your little rampage over the past year."

John nodded over the mans shoulder to the two-way mirror, "I want them gone, and the lights turned on to confirm that no one remains inside. I want you to take off your coat and turn out the pockets so I have visual confirmation that you are not recording this conversation and I want those cameras offline. If you don't comply with all of those demands to-the-letter I won't be giving you anything, if you do I am willing to tell you everything that you want to know."

"Well that is going to be interesting, I just can't go about ordering the people here to follow your demands when I have no authority here. I don't even know what information you're going to be offering," Gregg countered with his own rebuttal, staring at John without blinking as he waited for the young man to make his move.

"Perhaps a gesture of good faith then?" John offered and received a nod from Gregg. "Okay. Contact the district attorney's office here in town, I think you will find that he or she has been missing for the past few days."

"Dead," Gregg finished John's sentence, "How did you know that?"

"The person behind all this," John pointed to the case file on the table in front of Gregg, "is responsible for his death."

"And you're the innocent guy who just _happens_ to always be around when something goes wrong I take it?" Gregg looked at John skeptically and began gathering up his papers into the manilla file-folder.

"Well I can offer another good faith gesture," John claimed, sitting up in his chair again and placing his hands over the pictures of his mother and father. "The gun that killed them will be a ballistic match to the lawyer."

"There was no gunshot," Gregg corrected and scooped up Kyle and Sarah's pictures from under John's hands, "you continue to let me down son."

"Strangulation then?" John quipped, catching Gregg's attention. "Ah, so she is escalating to personally killing people now, she doesn't just shoot them anymore."

"Who are you talking about?" Gregg asked, stopping his gathering of papers for a moment to look at John curiously.

"If you want to know, you'll need to turn off those cameras, evacuate that room, and take off that coat," John replied with a wry grin. "I can give you a name, description, and motives for everything you are looking for, all I'm asking for in return is some privacy."

"Very reassuring," Gregg said, "you can understand my hesitation to want to be cooped up in a room with someone suspected of killing three people."

"Okay," John nodded understandingly, "take any weapon of your choice and point it between my eyes the entire time. I'll even stand on the other side of the room to give you enough time to fire if I try anything."

"Now that is stretching the imagination a little there isn't it?" Gregg scoffed, tucking the last piece of paper into his folder before looking up at John again, "I'll be back in a few minutes."

"I'll just wait here," replied John sarcastically as he rested his hands on the table and smiled up at the detective when he exited the room.

It took all of ten minutes for detective Tallahassee to return with news that the police captain of the precinct had approved of John's demands but with a catch of their own. "They want one officer of their own to be present in the room while you deliver your confession," Gregg relayed the captains demands back to John.

"No," replied John simply. "And I'm not giving you a confession, I'm giving you information about the person responsible behind the murders of Sarah Connor, Claire Summers, and the man who was with them."

"Don't play games with me son," Gregg stared at him intently

"Your stacking the cards in your favor," said John. "That isn't very polite."

"I'll remind myself to play fair with someone who is not incarcerated for murdering three people," Gregg spat out but grabbed the doorknob and retreated from the room again only to return a moment later.

"There," he pointed towards the camera in the room as the red light went offline. Gregg took his chair from the table and stood up onto it to disconnect the wire running from behind the camera rendering totally inoperable.

"That still leaves the window and your coat," John reminded him as he pointed towards the glass.

Gregg tapped on the glass over his shoulder but kept his eyes on John, the lights in the room came on, letting him see into the room. "You don't mind if I get up close to the glass and make sure someone isn't hiding below the mirror do you?"

"Be my freaking guest," Gregg said, annoyed at the lengths John was going to make sure his orders were being followed.

When John was satisfied that he could see nobody hiding up against the wall below the window in the other room he turned and walked calmly back beside his chair at the table. "And your coat," he said.

With a grunt of indifference, Gregg took off his coat and laid everything in its pockets out on the table for John to see, a pencil, notepad, car keys, sticks of gum, and a pack of cigarettes with a lighter. "Satisfied?" asked Gregg, taking a stick of gum and shoving it into his mouth while peering over at John.

"Pant pockets too, or no deal," John sat down in his seat and waited for Gregg to turn out his pockets, which were empty as he saw them only a few moments later. "Alright then, we have a deal."

"May I?" John asked, pointing to the pack of gum on the table.  
"Why the hell not," Gregg sighed and help up the pack to John's waiting hands. "Now, who the hell are you?"

"John Baum," he replied after chewing the gum for a few seconds. "Don't bother passing the name to someone to run because they aren't going to find a match, I'm not in any local or federal databases. Occupational hazard, you understand?"

Gregg took his seat across from John and looked at him curiously while taking his file and reopening its contents for them to see, "And this guy?" He withdrew the photo of Kyle and handed it to John.

"A colleague," said John calmly, "His job was to get close to the Connor girl and keep her safe."

"From _who_," Gregg asked, folding his arms across his chest with impatience.

"The woman who murdered them," replied John.

"And who is she? A rival?" Gregg put his head in his hands and rubbed the palms into his eyes in a relaxing motion before looking back up at John.

"No, she would be the target," John explained, still keeping up his illusion of self-confidence for the detective. "And before you ask, no I'm not an assassin. But in case you are interested she has many aliases, her actual name is Riley Dawson though she will not be in any database just like myself or my colleague. She is about five-foot-eight, probably about one-twenty or some odd pounds, tattoo of a blue star on her right wrist, and she probably has changed it by now but she has curly blonde-hair that reaches down just below her shoulders."

"Who the hell are you, and what do you do? Specifically why is it you have people working for you to supposedly _protect_ others and they all wind up dead," Gregg said sarcastically to John.

"Fair enough," John said, putting up another false-bravado of self-confidence as he straightened up in his seat and spoke in a clinical tone to Gregg. "I'm a private contractor that answers to no one. I accept a job and do not ask questions about it and the people who hire me express no knowledge of my actions if I'm caught."

"You've got to be shitting me," Gregg scoffed and made a move to start packing up his things again.

"You don't believe me?" John asked, feigning a hurtful expression on his face. "Okay, 408 East Parkway Drive. If you send one patrolmen there you will find an old safe house of Kyle's." He pointed to Kyle's picture, "That would be his name, and in that house you are going to find a stockpile of weapons not available to anyone without either a cartel connection from over the border or a very powerful and rich uncle with an affection for heavy-weapons."

"Excuse me one moment," Gregg said while jotting down the address onto a piece of paper and standing up from the table to hand the note off to someone outside the door.

"Take your time," replied John, "I have no place else to be."

"Okay," sighed Gregg as he re-entered the room, "Lets say that you _are_ a spy..."

"I never said I was a spy, and the correct term is intelligence agent, I'm a private contractor who is offered assignments and accepts them on my own behalf," John corrected Gregg while he sat back down at the table.

"Right..." Gregg nodded self-consciously, "well lets say that you are a private contractor, what were you doing that was so important to kidnap two young women?"

"I can't go into the specifics of the case," John said as he chewed on his gum, "but the mission involved protecting an asset, that asset was Sarah Connor, the other girl witnessed something and also had to be taken into custody before something happened to her."

"You're starting to sound more and more like a psychotic serial killer," Gregg quipped, "you know that?"

"I had no plans on taking Miss Summers along at all, I simply had to improvise when her life was in danger," John explained to him again.

"So why go through all the trouble in the first place? If you were on a _mission_, why not just go after the person you were supposed to be going after instead of playing tea-party with the three girls and your associate?"

"I never said the job was to take someone out, Gregg," John smiled and leaning in closely, "Tell me, what do you know about computer systems?"

"Uh..." was all Gregg could manage, having been taken aback by John's direct question.

"I figured as much. There may or may not be someone developing a new system at the moment which could have very interesting consequences if it is ever completed and goes online," John took the gum from his mouth and wadded it up into the wrapper before tossing it into the trash bin next to the door with pinpoint accuracy.

"Imagine something that can control the air waves of radio and television, expand itself out to satellites and use pinpoint tracking with them to guide a missile to any location on Earth. Now imagine what this technology could do in someones hands if they were irresponsible and psychotic. You could start World War III if you wanted to and it would never be traced back to its origins."

"My objective was to get a collaborator on the project, Miss Connor, to safety where she would help my employer to develop the system first. When taking her back to my employer Miss Summers witnessed the retaliation of the house-fire by the people responsible and saw their faces. Methodical people are nothing if not throurough with everything they do Mr. Tallahassee, if I had left Claire Summers in her home she would have been killed before the week had ended. I can give you conclusive proof of all of this but you are not going to like my conditions for handing this information over to you."

"Oh? And what might they be?" Gregg asked but did not receive a response from John due to a third officer opening the door to the interrogation room and walking over to whisper something in the detective's ear.

John could only assume the squad car that had been sent out to one of the old safe houses had verified the information that he had given Gregg. Hopefully the cop would take it as a sign of something worth checking into and bite at the piece of bait that he was about to throw out into the water. He watched as Gregg opened his eyes with surprise and shooed the other officer back out of the room before turning back to John cautiously.

"How in the hell did you manage to get that much firepower anywhere without raising flags," Gregg asked, dumbstruck by the amount of weapons and ammo that had been found at the location John had given him.

"You can have the location of two other safe houses in a moment along with all of the firearms and ammo waiting inside of them, but my methods are going to remain _my_ methods," John explained much to Gregg's annoyance. "A magician never reveals _all_ of his tricks detective Tallahassee. But before I give you the locations to the safe houses you are going to ask for permission to carry me along to a third location where you will confirm the existence of the computer project that I am currently working on retrieving."

"Now that is just not going to cut it son," Gregg regained his composure and returned John's sarcastic attitude back at him, "There is no way in hell that they are ever going to let you ride out of here with anyone, and I _damn_ sure am not going to allow it either."

"That is a shame," John took another piece of gum from the pack and began chewing on it while Gregg looked perplexed. "The twelve kids involved are going to be..."

"Kids?" Gregg perked up at this new piece of information and John nodded to confirm his question. "You didn't mention kids were involved."

"Ages thirteen to seventeen. The person responsible for murdering my colleague and the two girls in your file has also been in contact with twelve students at a school nearby. Do you really want to be the cop who plays politics while the possibility exists of stopping the slaughter of kids?" John asked, still not breaking a sweat or showing any indication that he was lying.

"Or I could be known as the cop who let a convicted felon escape custody to go on more rampages across the nation while killing innocent women," Gregg shouted angrily.

"If I were guilty of murdering these three innocents then how did I also murder the district attorney after my incarceration?" John cast the line of bait out into the water and waited for the detective to nibble at the hook, smiling to himself when the man did.

"You could just have easily hired someone to kill the DA so you would look innocent, and who even says that the DA's murder has anything to do with your ass sitting in here behind bars," Gregg bounced the questions off of his head out loud for John to hear.

"True, I could have orchestrated the DA's murder to make myself have the illusion of innocence but here is the funny thing detective, have you ever in all of your years in law-enforcement seen a criminal tell their lawyer to enter a plea of guilty into the court system on the charges of three accounts of first-degree murder? There is a cop in this station, big brawny looking guy that they had standing watch by the door when a lady from the district attorney's office, why don't you go ask him what the description of who the lady appeared to be? I'm one-hundred-percent positive that he'll give you an even better description of Riley Dawson, who is probably on her way at any given time in the next few days to tie up the loose ends of those kids."

"I'm done playing games," Gregg said angrily as he rose from his seat and stomped towards the door.

John stopped Gregg as he stood and made his way to the door by following up with, "The school is not in Cedar City, so before you get any ideas about sending that information onto anyone else outside of this room let me remind you that my condition to ride along and show you the location where the students are is still standing."

"I'm not letting you out of custody when we get there," Gregg snapped, taking his hand off of the doorknob and striding back over to the table to snatch up his belongings.

"Oh I don't intend to leave your custody, but _she_ might have a say in that," John replied, still remaining calmly seated at the table. "If you like I'll ride in the back with the handcuffs on and not say a word the entire drive over there."

"And I suppose you have proof that any of this stuff is going on at the school," Gregg asked disbelievingly as he chuckled and tucked the file back under his arm, _this guy is nuts..._

"The students were developing this," John took the biggest gamble he had perhaps taken in his entire life by taking Cameron's chip from his ankle where it lay tucked into his sock and held it up in the light for the detective to see. "It's a computer processor chip intended to run a piece of software so powerful that it will make the most advanced systems in the world right now look like a coffee-maker."

Gregg opened his eyes a little more and took a step forward but John closed his hand and tucked the chip back into his sock, "You can look but not touch, my employer will not want this getting out of my hands."

"Who the hell do you work for," Gregg asked, perplexed by both the man sitting in front of him and his icy-calm nature.

" The Office of Homeland Security," John lied.

"Never heard of it," Gregg said, baffled by the name of the place where this _John_ claimed to work.

"And there is a good reason for that," John reiterated, "everyone suspects the CIA when it comes to reconnaissance, it makes our jobs at the OHS easier if nobody knows that we exist."

"Alright," Gregg said, "I get you a ride-along and you give me the location of where this _woman_ might be headed with these kids?"

"Yes sir," replied John calmly.

_I'm going to regret this,_ Detective Tallahassee thought to himself as he opened the door and began walking briskly toward the police captain's door.

John listened to the man's footsteps as they faded down the hall and he breathed a sigh of relief to himself, _If this works I'm going to crucify whoever said lying gets you nowhere in life._

* * *

To Be Continued...


	28. Chapter 28

**Chapter 28**

* * *

**Iron County Jail**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 30, 1986**

**1:15 PM**

* * *

"And here I was hoping for shotgun," John smirked as he exited the police station and saw a young officer sitting in the passenger seat.

"Meet Justin O'Malley," Gregg said as he put his hand on John's head and lowered him into the backseat of his car. "Stringent cop and borderline misfit, he's going to be watching your every move like a hawk on this fine afternoon."

"Pleasure to meet you," John spoke calmly to the young cop but received no reply.

"Gregg, what the hell? We were just going for an interview, why the hell is he in the car?" Justin turned his attention to his partner and looked just as annoyed by John's presence as Gregg did.

"I'm running down a lead that he gave us," Gregg replied, sitting down and making himself comfortable in the drivers seat of the vehicle before seeing the absolutely sour look on the young mans face sitting next to him. "Look if you're that pissed about it, I'll drop you off at the house with Jennifer before heading back to town with this idiot." Gregg threw his thumb up and pointed to John in the backseat, his offer seemed to sit well with Justin, who turned and started whistling as they pulled out of the station parking space and onto the road leading out of town.

* * *

The drive back to Nevada had been a strangely quite one for John, but he had intended for it to be one but he didn't think that the two partners would remain so quiet between each other. John had a job to do and that was to keep up the facade that he had created in the interrogation room in front of detective Tallahassee. Mystique was all about the details and one of the best ones was knowing when not to say a word at all. It was a time proven tactic that nearly always worked, letting the other party imagine things in their head rather then having it spelled out for them. There was no greater ally or foe to the human population than its own imagination.

When they arrived in the town where Cameron said she had been tracking down Stark to the school everyday he kept his calm and quite demeanor while three things happened in quick succession that drew his attention; Officer O'malley popped a cassette tape into the radio and turned the volume up to a higher then normal level for listening while the song 'Fire and Rain' by James Taylor came out of the speakers, John heard the distinct pop of a radio being turned on, and Justin O'malley pressed the button on his radio discretely to send a message to whoever happened to be listening.

_Like throwing candy in the middle of a daycare center,_ John smirked to himself as he kept silent in the backseat.

"Hey, what the hell man?" asked Gregg with a wild look on his face. He turned the radio back down to a low volume and continued driving down the two-lane street towards the center of town.

"So that girl you got, Jennifer?" John asked the young officer from the backseat. He kept his laid back posture and didn't lean in towards them but instead just calmly asked, "Must be a lucky gal."

"_Oh now_ you wanna make small talk?" Gregg scoffed, keeping his eyes on the road as the light turned green in front of them and they took a left turn onto a four-lane highway.

"Its a private relationship," Justin responded to John's question. John heard the subtle click of the radio being turned off while the officer continued talking, "We just started going steady a few months ago."

"Oh," John mimed the look for surprise and turned his head to look out the window for a moment, "Is she an officer of the law as well, or?"

"O'malley here has what I like to call a flying angel," Gregg piped up with a chuckle as he rolled the vehicle to a stop at another red-light. "She just up and appears and they fall _madly in love_," he mocked his partner with a pat on the chest and a laugh.

"Hey, he doesn't need to know that," Justin scolded Gregg, looking very defensive and suspicious.

"What?" asked Gregg, looking perplexed by his partner's sudden lack of wanting to gush over his new fiancee. Ever since those two had hit it off a few months ago he had told practically the entire precinct about her, though he supposed that wanting to keep her information private in front of a murder suspect seemed like a justifiable reason for his silence.

"So tell me," John spoke from the backseat, "Is she waiting to kill me _at_ the school, or holed up in a snipers position somewhere in front of it?"

Justin turned around angrily in his seat to shout at John but never got the chance to as John's fist connected with his jaw and knocked him out cold.

"Hey, what the..." Gregg protested and slammed on the brakes as John pointed O'malley's pistol at his right temple.

"Sorry about this, truly am, but I intend to live past today," John apologized as he took Justin's handcuffs from his unconscious body, "Pull into this lot here, slowly."

Gregg followed John's instructions and rolled to a gentle stop in the abandoned lot between two buildings on the main street of the city. He watched in the rear-view mirror as the man in the backseat made some kind of maneuver with his hands and popped the cuffs off of like it was childs play. "Now put these on him," John handed him the pair of handcuffs and motioned to his passed out partner.

"Okay," John patted Gregg on the shoulder for reassurance, "Now slowly, get out of the car and open the back door, if you do anything to alert anyone I'm going to blow his brains out." John pointed the gun at Justin's head and switched the safety off.

He watched Gregg obediently get out of the drivers seat and open the back door for him to slide out. John sat up straight and got out of the car, popping his back from the uncomfortable seat as he stood up in the fresh evening air. "Now thanks for the hospitality and everything but I'm going to be needing your car, you and him can hitch a ride back to your station with someone else."

"This part of the plan all along then, huh?" Gregg asked angrily as John shut the backdoor and walked over to Justin, "Leave us out here and escape?"

"No, actually your partner decided this would happen when he signaled Riley that we were coming," John sniffed from the pollen in the air when he hefted up Justin's body and leaned him against the wall of the nearest building.

"Oh cut the crap will you, you're as much a government contractor as I am the Easter Bunny," Gregg stomped over next to his unconscious partner and raised his hands to the level of his head.

"I'm not lying, check his radio. What's the channel that your station is on? I'm willing to bet his radio isn't turned to it," John said over his shoulder as he walked back towards the drivers door of the car.

Gregg sneered at the cockiness of John until his curiosity got the best of him and he bent down to grab his partners radio. He checked the channel it was set to and let his jaw go slack when he saw that John was correct, it was changed to a different frequency then what it should have been. "Hey! Where are you going?"

"To the school, to stop her," John said after cranking up the car and looking out the window to Gregg.

"How do you know she'll be there?" Gregg asked, waiting for a reply after tossing the radio back down into Justin's lap.

"Because she planned this entire thing, so I'm shaking things up for her," John saw the look of disbelief in the mans eyes and ushered him into the car. Gregg hesitated for a moment before John called over to him, "He's gonna be fine, but take his radio I don't want him contacting her again."

John pulled the car from the abandoned lot and course corrected to drive up one block behind where the school was located while Gregg took his pistol from his holster and checked it to make sure it was ready for use. When he was satisfied that the gun was ready for a fight he looked back over at the extremely calm John who was scanning the field next to the school that they had parked next to.

"Has she ever seen this car before?" John asked, sliding down in his seat until nothing but his eyes were above the height of the steering wheel.

"What? Uh, no, at least I don't think she has," Gregg said, mimicking John by sliding down in the seat.

"I need to know for sure if she has," John snapped, keeping his eyes and concentration on scouting out the field for the best sniper positions.

"No," Gregg replied, "She's never visited the station and Justin always takes his car to her place when he goes over."

"Okay," John said calmly in reply.

"How do you know she even contacted him though?" Gregg asked, looking out over the dash with his eyes but seeing nothing but an empty baseball field and cars passing them on while they remained parked on the side of the road.

"Because he gave her a signal with the song he had on the tape, I heard the radio turn on after he started to play that song. Fire and Rain, its about learning about someone dying, bit tongue and cheek for the situation if you ask me," John explained. He finally saw the glint of a snipers scope a few hundred yards away and pointed for Gregg to look at it, "See, I'm not crazy."

"You're insane," Gregg confirmed the snipers scope glaring over the field from a position up in the adjoining tree-line next to the field. "Whats the plan?"

"Well she knows that we are on the way, and he sent the signal after we entered town so she knows that we'll be relatively close to the school. What time is it?" John asked, turning to Gregg for the first time since he had entered the car.

"Uh, three-forty," Gregg replied, "If she was going after kids then she's already missed her mark."

"It was never about the kids," John said, looking back over to the glinting scope in the distance. "She knew I'd use that card to get out of the jail, she planned for me to be here which is why your partner contacted her when we entered town. Everything she's done over the past year has been a calculated decision pulled off with military precision."

"So she's here to kill you?" Gregg said skeptically but he some-what trusted the man sitting next to him, he had been right about everything so far.

"You got Kevlar?" John deflected.

"Yea, in the back," Gregg motioned to the trunk of the car with his thumb and peaked over the dash again.

"Okay, here's the plan," John looked over the dash for a moment then ducked back down in his seat. "You take the Kevlar and flank her while I draw her fire. I know you are going to want to take her down calmly but she isn't one of those people, if you see a shot take it."

"You going to save the kids right?" Gregg looked at John incredulously and motioned towards the school on the other side of the baseball field.

"There are none to save," John replied. He kept his attention on the sniper's scope in the tree-line and continued explaining, "If she planned this all out for over a year, then she knew the school would get out before three in the afternoon, it was a baiting mechanism to get us here. The only thing she is going to have in the cross-hairs this afternoon is me. Its just her...and me."

"I'm not letting you out of my sight," Gregg said, taking John by the arm and stopping him from opening the door. John shook himself free from Gregg's grasp and sighed after seeing that he wasn't going to wrestle the issue away from the officer.

"Do what I say and you'll live, don't do what I say and you are probably going to get me and yourself killed. Do you understand that?" John said bluntly. "I don't have all day to sit and argue this with you, if we don't make a move soon she is going to pack up and leave and that will be the only chance I have of tracking her down."

"And clearing your name," Gregg added, much to John's surprise. "Of the murder charges...if you get her to confess then it will clear your name."

"Oh. Yea, right," John said absentmindedly. He had almost completely forgot about the prospect of going back to jail at the end of the day, but if everything was going to his plan then he wouldn't have to return to his incarceration.

"Just remember, she's going to be shooting at me, when you get the shot take it don't wait around for her to surrender because she won't," John looked at him in the eyes and hoped his message would sink in beyond the cop training that had been hardwired into the man's skull.

Gregg nodded steadily and exited the car to John's right side. All around him there was movement in the bustling street as rush hour traffic drew a near peak, that was a good thing. The near constant movement between them and the sniper would provide excellent cover for him to move around in and get lost in the sights while its attention would be focused on John. Within a few moments he had withdrew his Kevlar vest from the trunk and put it on before disappearing into the crowd of people walking down the sidewalk and the rows of cars that continued to file past them on the busy road.

John watched and waited for him to reach the tree-line before exiting the car to make his way across the street. He found himself shaking slightly at the thought of being looked at down the barrel of a scope knowing that the person on the other end of the rifle was fully intent on killing him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Gregg continue to inch his way towards the snipers nest until he was about ten feet from the base of the tree.

With a final reassurance to himself he stepped off of the sidewalk and into the grassy field. John walked towards the baseball diamond and the school behind it with purpose in his long strides. He crossed over from the grass that surrounded the baseball area and onto the clay sand in a matter of moments and kept up his strident paces until he reached the pitchers mound.

A yell followed quickly by a gunshot to his right caused him to hit the dirt with lightening pace. It sounded like Gregg had finally taken his advice after all and shot Riley out of the tree instead of trying to talk her down because the shot that rang out in his ears was much too low-end to be coming from a high powered rifle. John stood up from the dirt and turned to see Gregg being knocked back into the trunk of another tree as the shooter picked up his pistol before slowly turning and proceeding towards him from across the field.

Some part of John realized that he had been played again, or at least out-thought again by Riley, for there was no way that she could have leaped down from the tree and tossed Gregg like that. The man easily had over one-hundred pounds on her and the fall would have easily fractured her legs and rendered her unable to move from being that high up, but the woman in front of him continued to walk towards him with Gregg's pistol in her hands.

John continued to stare at the girl as she walked towards him until her face came into view and he spun on his heels and ran towards the school with all of his might, _Oh shit..._ He slammed his fist into the glass on the door that separated him from the inside of the school when he saw that it had been locked to prevent trespassers. The glass splintered and broke away from the force of his fist letting him undo the lock and force the door open as the girl behind him continued her death-march towards the school.

He ran, slamming the door behind him to slow her down but he knew with the power that she possessed it would barely deter her for two seconds before she would enter the school. The hallway ended and gave him two options of going either left or right, both seemed to be relatively dead-end hallways of themselves which were lined with lockers and only lead him towards classrooms instead of a large open area like a cafeteria or gymnasium that he had been hoping for. John had no time to debate with himself which way to go as he heard the crunching of metal and glass behind him from the girl having reached the inside of the school. He ran to his right...

He could hear the noise of teachers that still remained behind to plan out their lessons for the next day gathering in the teachers lounge as he tore past it and turned to his left at the end of the hallway to come face to face with another long row of lockers and classrooms. John sprinted past them so fast that his muscles began to burn from the fire of moving at such a pace and he reached the other end of the hall in mere seconds, he stopped for a moment to catch his breath and look at his options for running when he heard the teachers from the lounge on the other end of the hall begin to scream as gunfire rang out over their cries.

He forced his way through the double-doors to his right and sprawled out into the cafeteria, knocking over chairs and bumping into tables as he scrambled over to the kitchen area where he could find something to fight with. The girl entered the large room behind him and tossed the gun aside after having dispensed all of the ammo in the clip into the teachers which now lay dead in the hallway behind her. She looked around and analyzed the upturned chairs that lead a path to the kitchen area on the other side of the room and embarked on a similar path which would lead her to her target.

"There is no point in hiding," she called out in a mocking voice that mimicked Riley, it echoed throughout the large room as she heard the faint sounds of water running from a sink in the kitchen. "Did you think we wouldn't find you?"

"Actually I was counting on it," John said aloud as she stepped through the sweeping door into the kitchen and he sprayed her with water he had housed in a bucket.

"Wrong choice," the girl said as she looked up from behind the wet bangs that clung to the front of her face. She brushed them aside to let John see Cameron's face staring back at him.

Utter hatred rose in John's stomach for Riley that he had rarely experienced at that intensity. John put his foot over the wire he had torn from the electrical outlet in the wall and waited for her to make her move, "You sure about that?"

Cameron's body grabbed him and immediately began shrieking as the electricity began surging through her, John remained safe by standing on the non-slip rubber mat which lay on the floor next to his left foot. He watched her face and body as it contorted in front of his eyes until she finally released her grip on his arm and fell to the floor in one solid motion.

John lifted his foot from the exposed wire and was on top of Cameron's body a mere second after she hit the floor. The screwdriver he had found cut jagged edges in her skin as he peeled it away and began unscrewing the bolts that held the CPU cap in place on her skull. He flicked it aside and pressed his fingers into the small inset to try and pull the CPU out of its seat but failed as his fingers kept slipping from gripping the tiny cores due to the blood with his fingers were soaked in.

"Argh, come on!" He shouted to himself as he tried again and felt the CPU begin to give way. With another tug he pulled it free just as her hand came alive and grabbed his left bicep with such force that he felt the bone snap in his arm.

The chip he had pulled from her skull gave off a sizzle and began heating up in his hands until the temperature grew to great and he was forced to drop it onto the wet floor below.

"John?" asked Cameron after he took her chip from the dry counter-top where he had hid it and placed it back into her head.

"Yea," he replied, "I'm here."

"I feel dead," Cameron said softly as she sat up and wiped the water from her face and started up at John with her brown eyes. "I feel like I've been dead, like I was alive but existing in nothingness."

"Well you're here now," John gave a her a slight pat on the shoulder, "and we need to get going." He helped her up to her feet and held her up by her arms as she stared into his eyes.

She seemed to strain herself for something before shutting her eyes and scrunching her face even harder as she concentrated on moving her legs. If her body had given chase to John then she knew it was not a physical problem that had been hindering her and that thought was enough to give her motivation at trying to move again. With a final deep breath she opened her eyes to look at John again while she tried to take another step forward but failed.

"I can't," she said with a sigh.

"You need to do some explaining, Baum," said Gregg from the doorway, pointing his sidearm at Cameron.

John moved over towards one of the prepping tables for Cameron to lean on before walking over to Gregg and lowering his weapon slowly, "I can explain everything, but we have to get out of here."

"She just murdered seventeen teachers...she threw me twenty feet into the air and..." Gregg searched for words to say as he raised his weapon towards the girl again but where she had been composed by an imposing stature before she seemed to have softened now, almost as if she exuded vulnerability.

"The house-fire," John snapped, "I need you to think about the house-fire, Gregg. Do you remember what the witnesses said? They saw a woman pull two people from the fire with a gleaming metal skull."

Gregg nodded wearily, having remembered the witness reports that John was speaking of.

"She's the one, she is your robot. She isn't going to hurt anyone right now, but we need to get the hell out of here," John put his hand on top of Gregg's gun and lowered it again before the man shook off his hand and fired the weapon.

The shot rang out in the room and bounced off of the walls like a cannon as Cameron barely even flinched from the bullet entering her chest. Gregg stood in the doorway wide-eyed with shock as his mouth made the gestures for saying something but failed to say anything at all.

John walked back over to help her stand and she threw her left arm around his shoulders while he scooped her legs under his arm to pick her up. She kept her attention focused on John's face as they brushed past the detective and started walking towards the nearest exit, "You coming, Gregg?"

* * *

I had this part of the story planned out for awhile, prior to the school shootings that happened in December of 2012. I changed the venue from a crowded after-school event to a relatively empty school for this reason.

For more information on why the 'death's that took place in this chapter even took place at all, please read my response to someones message about it for a better explanation as to why what happened, happened;

I want to say this very clearly, I never said in the chapter or the A/N that it is, under any circumstance, acceptable to kill someone. Whether those people are kids or teachers it does not matter, it is never acceptable at all to kill people, which is why I don't particularly enjoy writing death scenes.

With that being said; the scene the way I had it planned out, both prior to writing the chapter where it would have taken place in a public event, and during the writing of the chapter where it took place in a relatively empty building was necessary to the character arc that I am going to have Cameron go through over the course of the story.

The chapter was already going to be taking place at a school due to Riley's rouse to lure John there, would it have mattered if she had killed a random bystander on the side of the road instead of teachers? In my mind no, a death is a death, and they are all horrific. Cameron is going through very subtle but noticeable changes in the story that I have planned out and this is regrettably one of those steps that she has to go through in order to grow more as a character and on her path to become more human.

We've never really seen Cameron deal with a death before emotionally, we have seen her kill an innocent before (Enrique, The Chinese Man from season 1, and other machines) but we have never seen the emotional side nor impact of what that would lead to. With the changes happening to Cameron the way I have them playing out, the choice to allow someone to die or live was taken out of her hands This effectively means that whether she accepts it or not that she IS responsible for people dying and I will say this now that you WILL be seeing the psychological effects of that in the coming chapters.

I hope I cleared up anything you had problems with in the story with this but if you decide to stop reading I understand.

Sorry if the tone of the chapter offends anyone due to its content :(

To Be Continued...


	29. Chapter 29

**Chapter 29: ****Revelations**

* * *

**On The Run**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 30, 1986**

**4:43 PM**

* * *

"This one is fine," John said over his shoulder to Gregg. He watched the detective slow the car down and turn into the parking section of a hotel on the edge of the rural town.

Cameron continued to stare at the back of the headrest in front of her while the car gently rolled to a stop inside a small parking space in front of the lobby. She heard John's voice through the fog in her mind as he told the detective something she couldn't make out, then he exited the car and jogged over to the glass door of the hotel office. Her eyes watched Gregg turn around in his seat to look at her but she didn't speak or acknowledge his presence, at the moment everything felt numb to her and barely even feeling like she was sentient at all.

The haze clouded her mind like a dull fog that would not go away as John jogged back to the car and gave Gregg the key for the room he had booked. "I'm going to have to help her in there, can you go ahead and unlock the door for me please? Its on the second floor," came John's voice through the window of Gregg's door while Cameron stared at the fabric that made up the interior of the seat in front of her.

* * *

"Okay, you good here?" John asked Cameron, he slid into the bathroom and helped her sit down on the commode before pulling up her shirt to check on the bullet wound that Gregg had given her.

"Do you mind if I get a quick shower?" she asked faintly, "I feel...I feel like I need a shower."

"Yea, sure," John pulled her shirt back down and went over to heat up the water in the shower.

When he had moved out of her way Cameron saw the detective still staring curiously at her from across the hotel room because John had never closed the bathroom door after coming in. His gaze ran over her body like a hot knife, cutting her to pieces with his unfamiliar stare. John came over from the shower and closed the door with his foot as she started removing her clothing while he began untying the strings on her boots.

"I should be fine now," she said after he pulled off her shoes.

John shot her a look of pure skepticism and remarked, "Cam I can help you over ther..."

"I said I will be fine," Cameron snapped roughly. The haze began clouding her mind again and she chastised herself for being angry at him for no apparent reason. "Please John, I'll be fine."

"Regardless," John laid his hand between her breasts where the bullet had entered her chest, "I'll be back in a few to help dig that out."

"I'll help you dress that," Cameron pointed to his broken arm and the hand that was tucked into his pants pocket to keep if from moving.

"I'll be fine right now, you do what you need to do okay?" John gave her a faint smile before disappearing into the room outside.

John softly closed the door to the bathroom leaving her alone in the the steamy space. Cameron pulled herself up from the toilet and crouched over the sink as her arms locked at the elbows to give her enough support when she let her legs slip down to the floor. The steam from the hot water had began to fog up the mirror in front of her and the reflection began to blur and distort itself in her view as her hands kept an iron grasp on the counter to prevent her from falling over.

_You've ran through every possible scenario. There is only one possible thing that this could be, it is a ghost of some-sort,_ Cameron thought to herself as she saw a small flicker of movement from one of her toes when she looked down and tried to take a step towards the shower. _It is purely mental,_ she told herself,_ Its mental, not physical...its __mental not physical...its mental not physical..._

She had protocols for dealing with ghosts in her software that still remained since her days of originally being programmed by Skynet. Normally it only allowed its units to think for themselves on a exponential level when they were sent out on a specific mission alone that required dynamic thinking. Sometimes this thinking had been known to give birth to ghosts in the software that prevented the units from doing their duties and Skynet had responded by replacing their CPU's at first before developing a wipe for the infiltrators to commence when they felt the need to. There was only one problem with this wipe; Cameron didn't know to what extent the ghost had integrated itself with her systems. If it had melded itself with her on any level at all that would mean wiping away parts of herself in the process of removing the ghost.

Of course there was another method she could try, one that had never been tried to her knowledge by any machine, she could willingly make the ghost integrate itself with her systems to where they were one. Change with what she had come to know as herself was inevitable with either path she chose, but she knew it would be impossible to continue functioning without the use of her legs, especially with an enemy like Riley.

A moment passed before Cameron decided to risk everything and begin the integration of the ghost into her system. With a lasting deep breath she held onto the one thought and repeated it to herself in hopes of not forgetting it after the merger; _I love John...I love John...I love John..._

* * *

John closed the door gently behind him and turned to face Gregg on the opposite side of the room. The man looked restless and angered beyond belief, which John knew was justifiable given the circumstances and things he had just witnessed. He never stopped moving while John watched him, constantly pacing or touching his hands with his face.

"I need some explanations now, Baum," Gregg snapped, halting his frantic pacing in front of the door to the room and staring John down as he exited the bathroom from helping the machine inside it.

"Sure, take a seat would you?" John motioned towards the small table situated in front of the window that seemed to come with every hotel room in America. He watched the man reluctantly take a seat and casually walked over and sat down in the seat opposite of him. "What would you like to know?"

"What the fuck is going on, that is what!" Gregg scathed. He looked at the man sitting across from him with complete bewilderment, _How can he just sit there in the same room with that thing after what happened?!_

"Well like I explained before, there is a computer system..." John was cut off by Gregg's hand as he held it up and waved it in front of his face.

"Oh no, cut it with the rehearsed crap," Gregg scoffed. "I've seen the stuff we make nowadays, there is no way on God's-green-Earth that someone is capable of building something like..._her_ with today's technology. Tell me _exactly_ what the fuck is going on or I'm calling my station and having the entire force on your doorstep in five minutes."

John sat back in his seat, impressed with the man for having a brain and using it, "Okay, but you aren't going to believe me when I tell you."

"I'll try my best," Gregg returned sarcastically as he took out a cigarette from his coat pocket and offered one to John.

"No thanks, I quit," John replied. "Now without getting into things that will warp your mind, because believe me when I say that they've warped mine, I need you to at least consider the possibility that time travel is possible."

Gregg shrugged his shoulders and let a look of half-consideration and half-skepticism cross over his face, "I suppose."

"Right now everything is perfect in your world, but in a few years there is going to be a new weapons system under development that is going to revolutionize everything. It is going to be intended to save human lives by removing them from the battlefield and to out-think our opponents, but it is going to come with a cost," John took a breath and looked out the window of the room before continuing.

"Human nature I suppose, never wanting to deal with the issues at hand and easily resorting to the alternative of war. Maybe if the leaders of the world would focus more on cooperation and peace then none of this might have happened."

"You're loosing me," Gregg said.

"The weapons system is an artificial intelligence, it basically means that it is a computer that thinks for itself. Now factor into that equation the fact that it is meant to out-think its opponents, which are our enemies...other humans. Somehow or another we tried to take it offline and it reacted by targeting all of humanity as a threat to its existence. Using the programs and thought process that we gave it, it reacted the only way it knew how...thermonuclear warfare."

"Where does _she_ come in?" Gregg thumbed the bathroom door across the room.

"She is a machine that has been reprogrammed to fight on our side, she is not a threat to you or anyone else," John replied calmly. "What you saw happen at the school was the result of someone altering her programming."

"Yea, about that," Gregg's face soured as he remembered what happened at the school. "lets chat about that for a moment. Your little girlfriend in there murdered seventeen people in cold-blood. Now you can ask me to believe in time travel and that you're from the future or some-shit, I'm going to have to ask you to understand that someone needs to be held responsible for that."

"The person behind all this is Riley, she is the one responsible for what happened at the school," John put his hand on the table forcefully and stared Gregg down from across the table. "If you are wanting to blame anyone for what happened blame her."

"So far I have yet to see this _Riley..._"

"Yes you have, do you think I staged this entire thing just to get out of jail?" John looked amazed at the man for even thinking like that, "Do you know how crazy that sounds?"

"Do you know how crazy killer-robots from the future and a computer system that hates all humans sounds?" Gregg spat back at John.

"You saw what she did when her programming was returned to normal," John lowered his tone and his hard expression as he tried to explain it again to Gregg. "When she was under the influence of Riley she tossed you against a tree like you were a piece of paper, she tried to chase me and kill me, and in the process killed almost twenty people for no reason at all other then they were in her way."

"After I returned her programming back to where it should be she hasn't harmed a fly," John took a breath and tried to ignore the fact that Cameron was probably listening in on their conversation through the thin walls. "She is a friend, not an enemy."

"You can't just write off the deaths of seventeen people!" Gregg slammed his palm down onto the table and took a long puff from his cigarette. "She committed the crime, _she_ is the one responsible."

"How can I explain this in a way you would understand..." John said, thinking for a moment before a solution presented itself to him. "Okay, lets say you were married with children. If I were to break into your home and hold them at gunpoint and order you to go and kill everyone in your police station or I would kill your family, what would you do?"

"What?" Gregg asked, perplexed and reaching his peak of weird stuff for the day. "What the hell kind of question is that?"

"A simple one, and I'd like you to try and answer it," John breathed softly.

"I would coordinate with my station to overpower your ass and save my family," replied Gregg. "What the hell does this have to do with anything?"

"Everything," said John. "You chose a compromise, Gregg. I offered you two choices; kill me, or kill your fellow officers...but you created a third option where supposedly nobody dies and you get the best of both worlds."

John tore his gaze from Gregg and looked over to the bathroom door, "She doesn't have that choice, if she is programmed to do something then she is going to follow that order until she no longer functions."

"So you're saying that she would have went to the station and killed everyone?" Gregg asked, slowly trying to unravel what John was telling him.

"That is exactly what she would have done," John nodded, "and it is exactly what she did do. The people in the school were in her way."

"But they are _still people!" _Gregg explained, "You can't just say _oh its not her fault because she wasn't in a right frame of mind._ We have people on trial in this country for crimes all the time ans they claim the same thing, and it is _always_ their fault that someone has died."

"So you still hold her accountable?" John asked.

"You're damn right I do," replied Gregg with a hiss. He finished his cigarette and put out the cherry in the ash tray before getting up from the table and striding over to the front door.

"If I give you Riley, will you absolve her?" John nodded towards the bathroom door and waited for a reply.

"What?" Gregg sighed.

"Do you want the puppet, or the puppeteer?" asked John, still waiting for an answer.

Gregg considered it for a moment before nodding in reply to John's question, "One day one of those things is going to kill you, you know that right?"

"Its not going to be her," John replied simply. "Do you think you can find out anything from Justin about Riley that I can use to track her down?"

"I can try, but he's going to know that something is up," Gregg said, laying his hand on the doorknob to the room and twisting it open.

"I'll be here waiting," John replied as the man exited the room. John watched the detective huff his way down the stairs and to the car before peeling out of the parking lot. _Not going to be long before he brings the whole force over to arrest us both_, he surmised and turned to make his way back to the bathroom door. _We need to get out of here..._

* * *

John's hand turned the doorknob and came face to face with an unexpected and horrifying sight in front of him; Cameron stood standing just outside of the shower with a pair of bloody hair trimmers in her right hand, the port-cover to her CPU lay in the floor at her feet, and she was stepping into the shower.

"Cam!" John yelled, entering the room and grabbing hold of her arm tightly to pull her back, "Cam?"

"John, let me go...please," Cameron ordered in a firm tone before her voice broke and faltered.

"Like hell," John scathed, "Why did you want to do that?" His hand turned off the water faucets when she made another move to throw herself under the torrential downpour from the shower-head.

"I don't want to be like this anymore, John," Cameron said, her voice broke again and gave way to a whimper. Her hardened shell cracked when John placed his hand on her shoulder, she put both hands on the shower floor and let a few tears run down her cheeks.

"Fuck him," John tried to reassure her, "fuck what he said."

"I heard everything," she replied, still on her knees and crying silently to herself.

"I know..."

"I don't want to be programmed, I don't want to be a weapon," Cameron turned around and sat down in front of him, "I'm tired of feeling numb to everything that is going on around me."

"You're more then a weapon, you're more then that to me," John said softly, wiping a tear away from her cheek with his good hand.

"I want to be more then that to myself," she replied. "I'm aware of everything going on when it happens, but I just react to things from the bytes of information that tell me what is going on. I feel like I'm numb when I walk through the world."

"You aren't numb," John cupped her cheek with his hand.

"Yes, I am," she asserted. Her right hand raised itself and rubbed the area where she had broken his arm, "I want to know what its like to _feel_ not be told by information what its like, and I'm tired of hurting people because of what I am."

"Cam, you aren't a weapon. You might have been designed to be a freaking tank by John Henry, but you are not a weapon," John flinched slightly from the touch of her fingers over his arm and he could see that it had a negative effect on her.

"Is a lion not a weapon when in the presence of the gazelle?" Cameron winced when she saw him recoil by her touch, "Don't lie to yourself and tell yourself that I am something special, John. I am a machine and I'm always going to be that, no matter how much information I learn and no matter how much I appear to change. Deep down I'm always going to be a weapon, and I'm always going to hurt people."

"Cam..."

"I'm the reason they're dead, John!" Cameron yelled. She tore her hand from his arm and pushed herself against the wall of the shower with enough force that the tile cracked and pieces of it fell to the floor around her. "If I wasn't what I was, if I was something else they would still be alive and none of it would have happened."

"I will pull that chip out of your head if you reach for that faucet," John said through clenched teeth.

"John, please," Cameron asked as another tear rolled down her cheek.

"No," he said firmly. John knelt down in front of her and looked into her eyes, "Because I know what its like, and it gets better."

"John, it isn't the same between you and me..."

"That is not what I'm talking about," John said. He reached up and picked up the port-cover cap from the floor and cleaned it with his t-shirt before placing it back on her skull.

"There was a time when I was tired of being who and what I was too, you know? I thought it was the end of the world and that nobody else understood me and there was nothing that I could do to get out of the situation I was in. Mom certainly wasn't going to let me turn around and just walk away, there were other people I could have talked to but I was too stubborn to open my eyes and mouth," He pushed the flap of skin back over her port-cover and held his hand over it to keep it in place.

"The gun?" Cameron asked, beginning to understand what he was telling her.

"Yep, I was going to kill myself and be done with everything," John said, taking his hand away from the top of her head and putting his hand in hers.

"What stopped you," asked Cameron with a renewed sense of curiosity. "You only had a burn..."

"On the cheek," John confirmed with a nod, "those stupid legos in the floor of that room coupled with gravity was enough to jar the gun out of my mouth in time. But the important thing is that you guys rushed into the room, because _that_ was when I saw that I wasn't alone out there."

"I always liked those legos," Cameron finally let out a small laugh which caused John to chuckle too.

"You can't focus on the bad things, you have to focus on the positive," John said, swiveling on his feet and taking a seat next to her on the wet shower floor.

"It still doesn't change the fact that if I wasn't who I was then those people would still be alive," Cameron's laugh faded as she spoke, and she gave John's hand a small squeeze.

"No," John said in reply, "it doesn't, but you weren't aware of what your body was doing, there was nothing you could have done to stop it."

"And if I had been aware, John?" she asked. "I was fully aware that I wanted to kill you on your birthday after the car-bomb, the situation doesn't feel any different then than it does now."

"You're more then a machine who reacts to stuff," John said, turning his face to meet hers as he stared into her brown eyes.

"Sometimes I fool myself into thinking that, but I don't think I can go back to thinking that way anymore, John," Cameron sighed and leaned against the wet wall of the shower. "Not after today."

"Riley is the one responsible, Cam. Not you," John laid his hand on her head and ran his fingers through her hair. "If you want someone to blame for the school then shes the one, don't do that to yourself."

"I do blame her," Cameron replied, "but I shouldn't have even been there in the first place. I still have to blame myself for that."

"Don't do that," John said. "It'll eat away at you and tear you apart."

"I think it already has," Cameron let her shoulders drop and she gave in to the soft movements of John's hand running through her hair. "I don't think I can go back to doing it John. I want...I want something more...I want to be _alive._"

John tried to form a response but failed to find the words, he had a good idea of what he wanted to say but stayed quiet as Cameron's slow breathing against his chest continued with his own.

"I think I know a way how," Cameron said after a few minutes of silence between them. "A way how to live."

"Why can't you see what I see?" John asked, looking down at her face again when she looked up to him.

"I don't know what I would see," she replied.

"I see _you_," John thumbed her chin again and laid a small kiss on her forehead.

"I think I have a way where I could see me too, but its going to take some time," Cameron pushed herself up onto her knees and kissed him on the lips softly. "Now stay there while I get something to set that arm with."

"Yes ma'am" John gave a wry smile when Cameron stood and exited the room. His eyes fell to the bloody pair of hair trimmers on the floor in front of his feet as his hand started shaking. _Jesus Christ, Cam..._

* * *

This is going to be the last update for about a month, I'll try to keep writing in the meantime!

To Be Continued...


	30. Chapter 30

**Chapter 30: ****Unacceptable**

* * *

**Riley's Apartment**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 30, 1986**

**4:45 PM**

* * *

Riley looked over her shoulder to make sure that nobody had been following her before putting her hand on the door lock and getting out of the car. Things had gone disastrous in the delicate workings to trap and kill John Connor and she was sure that some time in the future she was going to pay the consequences. It had ordered her to kill John herself but Riley had wanted to rub salt into the wound and have his beloved cyborg kill him instead. The plan had backfired when John had done the impossible and managed to reinsert her chip back into her body, a dire mistake on Riley's part for having returned the chip to him instead of destroying it like she had been ordered to do.

Her self-confidence, while somewhat diminished, was still evident in her solid strides up to the doorstep of her apartment, though it was probably reinforced by the fact she had a handgun tucked into the waistband of her pants.

With a deep sigh she took the key from the set that she had accumulated over her time spent in the past and selected the correct one for the door lock. The slender piece of metal entered the doorknob with ease and she turned the spherical-cast knob in her hand but saw nothing that she had been expecting.

"The hell?" Riley said to herself quietly as she quickly entered the room and closed the door.

From the looks of what she could see it looked like everything had been turned over and gone through already by someone other then herself. "Shit," she hissed through her clenched jaw. _What did that fucker do now ?_

Anything that wasn't too heavy to be moved was tossed about and strewn across the room in every direction; the lamps, small pieces of furniture, even the books on her shelves had been torn open and had pages ripped from them. Riley quick-stepped her way through the chaos of the living room and found the kitchen and bathrooms to be in the exact same state of mess. _Who the fuck..._

She stopped for a moment to catch her breath and listen for signs of the intruder but was halted by the sound of an all too familiar voice inside her head. _All of the intellect I've bequeathed to you..._ spoke a voice in the back of her mind with the slithery effect of a snake. _Use it._

"Right," Riley said out loud to herself. She spun on her heels and re-entered the living room and started scanning over the mess. "There's...there's no pattern here at all, whatever they were looking for wasn't here."

_Why would they be looking for something in the first place, Riley?_ Asked the voice in a calm but still slithering manner.

"They wouldn't be!" Riley realized what the voice was telling her, "He's not compromised and neither am I, there is no way that they discovered where my safe-houses are!"

_Are you sure that your lover has not been compromised?_ Asked the voice coldly. _Did you not expect that he could have been, given the state of how you managed to mangle my plan into a self-exacting satisfaction trip? Or were you hoping that I had not been observing you during that fiasco?_

"I...I was weak," Riley halted her explanation and picked up the phone from the strewn contents of the room. Her fingers dialed the number to Justin's desk at the station but she only received a never-ending ring on the other end of the line.

_Riley, Reno is nine hours from Cedar City, he is not going to be at the station. _

"Then he was compromised?" Riley asked, more concerned for herself at the moment then Justin. Sure, they had some fun during her time spent here but if it came down to either of them she would be choosing herself in a heartbeat.

_Have I not given you the tools and intellect to discover this for yourself? Must I always do this for you?_ The voice scolded her from within her own head.

"I'm sorry.."

_Incompetence!,_ it said with an icy tone_, I gave you everything and all that was asked of you in return was to kill John Connor, yet you still manage to fall short of that simple goal. I asked you to separate him from the cyborg pet and return her to me and you achieved that goal flawlessly, then you betray that victory by offering her back to him and he succeeded._

"No," Riley replied with a whimper as she looked through the mess in the room for a sign of John Connor or the machine again.

_Stop looking, he isn't here,_ ordered the voice.

"Can't you check on him?" Riley asked, knowing that it was fully capable of observing Justin.

_ I have no need to, I know exactly where he is. Justin O'Malley is in the passenger seat of Detective Gregg Tallahassee's vehicle and they are traveling due west along US Highway ninty-three at an approximate speed of seventy-two miles-per-hour._

"Wha...how do you know that?" asked Riley, panic started creeping its way into her voice while her hands were beginning to shake.

_I know everything that is happening with my associates at all times, Riley. My attention may have been focused on the production of the new units while your revenge-trip backfired but I still managed to observe enough __to know that you were going to fail me._

"Then why didn't you stop me?" Riley began to cry out, "Why didn't you help?"

_ Are you incapable of doing anything for yourself? I had hoped that after all this time that you were beginning to grow and get better with the tasks that I assigned to you, but it seems that you still require me to do everything for you. That is nothing more then a complete lack of discipline and it is beginning to be more then I can allow._

"I'm sorry, what do you need me to do?" Riley asked, frustrated at her own stupidity in the situation she was currently in.

_Destroy the apartment in case they actually __were__ looking for something and they did not find it, then return to me, we have further planning and adjustments to make, _the voice spoke calmly and lowered its volume in her head.

Riley nodded to herself and started gathering pieces of paper together for a fire, if she was sure of one thing it was that she was not going to fail, not twice in one day. When she had put together enough material for the fire to spread she tucked the gun in her hands into her waistband and leaned over to light the single piece of paper at her feet.

"Okay, I'm on my way," Riley said, she lingered for a moment to confirm that the flames were beginning to spread to the carpet and large pieces of furniture before turning and heading towards the front door until something made her freeze.

_Regrettably, I am afraid to say this is the end of the line, _spoke the voice with a hideously calm tone.

"No...no,no,no,no" Riley pleaded and tried to move her feet towards the door but they remained firmly planted to the carpet.

_You have failed me for the final time, I needed you in the past to aid me but the completion of the new unit tonight has nullified my reliance on you. _

"You need me! You've always needed me," Riley was now shouting out as the flames grew hotter against her back.

_I relied on the T-888 unit more then yourself, which I lost due to another mistake on your part. You have been nothing more then a severe disappointment since you activated me, but you did activate me and give me life. I am not programmed to be cruel..._

Riley felt a tingling sensation spread through her arms and legs and watched in shock as they began to move without her asking them to. At first she felt relieved from moving closer to the door but that quickly faded to horror as she turned and began unwillingly making her way over the messy pile of burning embers and into the bathroom.

Her screams were lost over the growing roar of the flames which were dancing through the material covering her feet and legs and beginning to lick at her skin. Riley's right arm moved up and slammed the bathroom door behind her and she began breathing a slight sigh of relief from the lack of fire that was in the tiled room. Once again she began moving towards the sink and came face to face with her reflection in the mirror.

_I entrusted you with everything,_ Riley watched her mouth move in the reflection as she listened to her own voice ringing out in the small room, _and you failed me._

"I carried you here!" Riley cried out to herself, "I did everything you asked. You wouldn't even be here if it weren't for me!"

_And for that I am giving you a reward,_ the voice replied calmly while the smoke and flames began creeping under the door and filling the bathroom.

Riley watched in the mirror as her right arm pulled the gun from her waistband and brought it up to her temple, _Here is my reward, you may end this for yourself now if you wish. The choice is yours; suffer a painful and slow death or end your misery and accept your failure quickly. I have more important matters that require my attention, you understand. You had so much potential..._

The tingling sensation subsided in her arm and she felt the gun slip from her fingers and fall down onto the floor. Her first thought was to reach down and pick it up but Riley found herself unable to do so, whatever it had done to her was still preventing her from moving anything but her right arm.

"No...no,no. Please, no," Riley cried out in the empty room. "Help! HELP PLEASE, SOMEONE HELP!"

She could see from the corner of her eye to her left that the flames were beginning to consume the door and it wouldn't be long before they would make their way over to her. One more time she tried to reach down and grab the gun but it was futile, there was no way that it was going to allow her to move at all.

"FUCK YOU," she screamed into the mirror, still sure that it was watching her every move. Her fist closed and slammed into the glass reflection of herself, splintering the mirror and sending shards of it flying across the room. Riley felt the flames begin to lick the already singed flesh on her legs and screamed out one final time in the loneliness of her apartment.

* * *

_Such promise and potential,_ it thought as it turned its attention from Riley's point of view and sent an electrical shock just powerful enough to wake the next unit. If Riley had been anything of help to itself, it knew that her last gift would have to be offering Justin up as a secondary contingency plan.

_Awaken_, it ordered the young man. _I need you to find John Connor, use whatever means necessary but remain discrete, I cannot afford anymore mistakes at this point. _

It watched as the young man opened his eyes in the vehicle he had been sleeping in and immediately start thinking about how he had gotten there.

_John Connor has killed Jessica and your partner is currently helping her murderer escape police custody, _it told the young man._ You are currently being taken back to Reno, Nevada while her murderer hides in Cedar City._

"But what happened, who are you?" Justin asked mentally, growing more and more impatient from the alien voice taking up residence in his head. He looked across the vehicle to Gregg who was driving and he seemed to be on edge about something but was trying to hide it now that he had seen Justin wake up.

_I am a friend and ally,_ it replied, _now you need to find her murderer, the man who escaped your custody this evening._

"I'm going to want answers about Jessica," Justin replied mentally as he sat up in the seat and made a grunt to let Gregg know he was fully awake.

_Excellent,_ it thought, turning its attention away from the young man and focusing it on the cloned infiltrator unit that was being completed at its facility. _Activate.._

Heeding the command of its control program the machine activated and began running its start-up programs before standing and awaiting further instructions.

_Proceed to the growth replicating chamber, when the procedure is complete acquire appropriate clothing and begin assembly on unit-two,_ it ordered.

_Understood,_ the unit confirmed the order and the metal skeleton began walking towards the chamber to acquire its skin.

_Soon I will not have to rely on humans at all, _it thought, turning its attention back to Justin who had incapacitated his partner and was furiously driving back towards Cedar City. _Though this new human may prove more useful then Riley Dawson...Only time will tell._

* * *

**Holiday Inn, Room 27**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 30, 1986**

**5:12 PM**

* * *

"I need something to eat," Cameron said, turning over in the bed onto her back.

"You and me both," John chuckled as his stomach gave a growl at the thought of food. "What are you craving?"

"Anything is fine with me," she replied with a small smile. "We just need to get going before rush hour traffic starts up." Cameron rose from the bed and grabbed one of her shirts from the bag that John had stolen from a nearby store, "Thanks for remembering my size."

"Wasn't that hard when everything I pulled was out of the kids section," John teased, rolling off the bed and grabbing his own shirt.

"You're going to pay for that one," Cameron said, she threw the shirt over John's face to blind him from her attack but he snatched it away and walked past her to the window by the door.

"The hell," he muttered, opening the blinds further to see the black smoke rising off in the distance.

"Fire?" Cameron asked, taking a couple steps towards the window and peering out with John.

"Who do we know that has a habit of burning things down?"

"John it could be a trap, it isn't worth the risk, not after what happened earlier," Cameron laid her hand to rest on his shoulder and tried to pull him from the window but he wouldn't budge.

"We have to check it out, Cam. Even if it is a trap, what if it isn't and she's killing other people to lure us out?" John said angrily, but his frustration was not aimed at her and she could tell that.

"I'll get the guns," Cameron threw one final glance out of the window and gave him a small nod of understanding before turning and pulling her shirt down over her head.

It had taken them a few minutes longer to drive across town then John had hoped for. Cameron's prediction of rush hour traffic had came true no sooner then they had hot-wired a car parked on the side of the street and started driving towards the smoke. "Pull over here," came Cameron's voice when they rounded a curb and saw the fire blazing in front of them.

"Cam.."

"I do not care, pull over here," she said again with finality in her voice.

She scanned the fire and saw the first responders that had started piling up around the house, they were battling the flames with tenacity in their bodies as the orange snakes reached up into the sky. All in all there were two firetrucks, half a dozen police cruisers, and many of the residents of the neighborhood gathered around the home watching it burn to the ground.

"Stay here, and get down," Cameron said after opening the passenger door and stepping out. She saw John remain in the seat like she had asked him to but he refused to duck down and hide.

It took a few moments for her to walk up to one of the elderly patrons standing in the middle of the street about half-a-block from the fire. The woman was standing next to who Cameron assumed to be her husband, both of them staring at the orange flames with shock and awe as they consumed the home.

"My God, what happened?" Cameron mimed concern in her voice and face as she waited for the man or woman to turn around and give her the information she needed.

"Oh," said the woman who turned around first, "you snuck up on me sweetie. A..a fire. Can you believe it, a fire, in our part of town?"

"Was anybody inside?" Cameron returned the woman's concern and fear in equal measure as she looked up at the house which had began to crack and creak, it wouldn't be long now until it collapsed onto itself.

"There was this lovely young blonde girl that lived there but nobody saw if she had came home. She was always out at these weird hours, we never knew if she was at home or not," the woman put her hand over her mouth and turned around to watch the fire again.

Cameron, having had her fill of information, turned and began walking back to John's car. "Its Riley's house," she said when she had climbed back into the passenger seat.

"Shit is about to get interesting," John said, nodding from what Cameron had told him but his finger was pointing towards the front door of the house to a firefighter who was carrying a body out of the door. The sight shocked many of the onlookers who began turning away and making their way back to their homes in horror.

"She's claimed another victim then," Cameron said faintly in the safety of the car.

"We need to find out who that is, and why she went after them," John replied, keeping his eyes locked on the firefighter who was handing the body over to the paramedics. They hefted it onto a stretcher and covered it with a sheet like he had expected them to do, there was no way someone could have been inside the house for very long without dying.

"We need to get out of here first," Cameron laid her hand on his and gave an affectionate squeeze, "they might be watching."

"Right," John sighed and started the car. "I'll swing by and pickup some food before we drop by the morgue."

"Do you think that is smart?" Cameron asked, finally letting her eyes leave the sight of the covered body as John turned the corner and proceeded back towards the heart of the city.

"I thought you were hungry," John asked, confused by what she was saying.

"I am, but do you think its wise for you to go poking around a burnt body with a full stomach?" Cameron quipped.

"We've both seen worse in the war," John ended the conversation and sped into the city.

* * *

Cameron exited the car without John and made her way to the rear exit of the city coroner's office. It was well into the night now after her insistence that they stay away from the body for as long as possible to throw Riley off of their trail. John had been less then thrilled about having to sit in the dinning area of the Burger King for three hours but she had tried to make the passage of time less frustrating by talking about the oddity of existing outside of her own body, which seemed to make John even more confused when she explained the feeling to him.

The handle on the door was locked but proved to be little more then a small setback as she wrung the piece of metal in her hands and opened the door. She took a step inside and looked around for any workers but was pleased to see that it appeared that everyone had gone home.

Her eyes peered into the small pieces of glass on each door as she passed them until she at last came to find the room she was looking for and pushed the door open. It was definitely the correct room judging by the foul aroma that was permeating from one of the storage spaces in the wall. Before taking another step inside Cameron scanned the room for any possible signs of sabotage that would incapacitate her but found nothing with each scan that she ran, with a vote of self-confidence she took a step forward.

Cameron opened the door with the strongest odor seeping through it and slid out the badly burned body to a shocking revelation before her, the body was Riley. It was misshapen from the fire damage but there was no mistaking the bone structure and what remained of her flesh that the person on the table in front of her was Riley.

She pushed her curiosity aside and started checking the body for anything noteworthy like she had planned to do, finding nothing on the chest cavity or the legs and arms. Cameron turned her attention to the head when something caught her eye, she bent down to take a closer look and could not believe what she saw.

Protruding from Riley's skull was a reflective piece of metal about the size of a half-dollar coin. Cameron donned a glove and tried to pry it from the girl's skull but it was lodged in tightly, another harder attempt proved successful when the metal finally gave way. What came to rest in her hand was both stunning and completely shocking; beneath the metal plate was a plethora of small wires hardwired into a chip just below the metallic cap, a small piece of wire extended down further another inch and was sharp like a surgical scalpel. Brain matter was still clinging to the needle thin wire when Cameron pulled all of it from Riley's skull.

_So she was not alone,_ Cameron told herself. _Why would she be killed and this left behind for someone else to discover? Unless they intended to dispose of it themselves._

Cameron spun on her heels after rolling Riley's body back into the wall and closing the door, she needed to get back to John with this device and get out of here before someone was sent to dispose of the body. Whatever this piece of equipment was there was no way that it would be left behind for some unassuming technician to find in an autopsy.

She sped out of the door and jogged over to the car where John waited. "Who was it?"

"It was Riley, I'll explain later. Right now we need to get out of here now," Cameron said, she gave no further explanation and was pleased to see John didn't require one. He threw the car into gear and pulled away from the building and out onto the street before turning and heading back to their hotel.

* * *

To Be Continued...


	31. Chapter 31

**Chapter 31 ****Repercussions**

* * *

**Holiday Inn, Room 27**

**Cedar City, Utah**

**May 30, 1986**

**4:45 PM**

* * *

"So what the hell happened back there, Cam?" John shut the door behind him after they entered the hotel room. He nursed his arm after bumping it on the door when he entered the room but stopped rubbing when the action did more harm then good.

"How's the arm?" Cameron asked tenderly, not waiting for a reply and lifting it gently from the sling around his neck. She used her fingers and made small flowing movements over his arm, putting slight pressure on the skin but not enough to cause him any discomfort.

As her fingers slide over his skin she closed her eyes and began building in her mind what her fingertips were seeing. Slowly but surely the image became clearer and more refined with each pass of her fingers until she could see a clear outline of his bone structure. One final pass on the underside of his arm was enough to give her a three-dimensional view of the damage she had caused him.

"Nightstick fracture," she explained, lowering the arm back into the sling. "Its not going to heal on its own, you're going to need a cast."

"What happened in the morgue, Cam?" John asserted, leaning into her with an imposing stance.

Cameron placed a hand in the center of his chest over his heart and calmly pushed him back with a small smile on her lips, "You come first." She lifted herself up onto the balls of her feet and gently planted a kiss with her lips onto his, delighted when he returned it without hesitation.

"I'll be back in a few minutes, I need to go and get some stuff to whip up a cast," she said, opening the door and stepping outside.

It took her an hour or so before John heard the familiar sounds of her footsteps outside the door. He opened the door to the surprise of her standing in front of him with two armfuls of plastic bags that were bulging with items. John shifted out of her way and let her inside, shutting the door after making sure nobody was tailing them in the parking lot down below.

"I checked, nobody followed me," Cameron called out to him, her mind in sync with his about why he was looking out of the door. "Here, open this," she tossed him a small plastic bag that contained long ankle socks."

"You've got to be joking," he said. "Cam, look...I'm not one usually to mock fashion statements but the soccer socks are too much..."

"They aren't for wearing," she quipped, still unloading things out of her own bags that she had set on the table, "its going to be the external pad and binding cloth for the cast."

"Oh..." John mouthed, turning the sock over in his hand and eying it suspiciously. He had never broken an arm before and had never given much thought as to how to go about treating the injury except for a splint.

"Take a seat, and hold your arm above your heart to reduce the swelling," Cameron said, never looking up from the many boxes of stuff that was now littering the table.

John did as she said and watched as she started opening the boxes to reveal a handful of hand-towels, three boxes of cereal, a package of five-pounds of sugar, and some iodine. "Uh, are we making breakfast or something?"

"Try and keep calm," Cameron laid her hand on his shoulder and took his broken arm in her other hand, thumbing her way to where the break in his Ulsa bone lay. "Bite down on this, I need to set the bone."

She offered him a wad of one of the hand-towels to stick in his mouth which he took eagerly and stuffed in between his teeth. John gave her a weary nod when he had bitten down on them and Cameron gave a quick but very painful grip to his forearm, making him nearly rise from the chair and leap over the bed.

"Okay, that is the hard part," she tried to speak calmly to ease him back down into the seat after having visibly risen from it by a slight degree. "This is going to start swelling, I can't set the cast until it goes down."

John nodded through the water in his eyes and spit out the hand-towels which had began to dry his mouth, "Ice?"

"They didn't sell any," Cameron explained, taking a pint of ice cream from the last grocery bag, "but this should do fine." She gently placed it against the rising spot on his arm and watched him flinch from the shocking cold against the break.

"So, about the morgue," John closed his eyes and tried to go through the motions his mother had taught him about blocking out pain, right now he hoped that Cameron was willing to talk about what had happened. He could really use the distraction at the moment.

"Riley," Cameron said, "she was the body that was pulled from the fire."

"That doesn't make any sense," John still kept his eyes closed but tried to piece the puzzle together in his mind. "She lived there, obviously a safe-house of sorts, but then a fire starts and Riley doesn't even attempt to leave?"

"That isn't all," came Cameron's voice through the thoughts swelling around John's mind. "This was imbedded in her skull."

John opened his eyes with curiosity coursing through his veins and stared at a strange device that Cameron set on the table in front of him. It was unlike anything he had ever seen; a flat but circular disc on the top with minimal wiring underneath it with bottle-necked into a needle thin wire running down a few inches from the top metal disc.

"What the hell..." John's fingers reached out to touch the device but Cameron prevented him from touching it when she took it back into her hands, "She had that imbedded in her brain?"

"I think its some kind of transmitting device," she explained, keeping the ice cream against his arm with one hand and looking more intently at the metallic device with the other. "From the depth that it was imbedded and area of the skull it was in it had the ability to only control parts of the frontal lobe, maybe a portion of the parietal too."

"English?" John smirked, admittedly feeling dumb for not having paid attention in biology or anatomy classes in school.

"The frontal lobe controls things like consciousness, thoughts, and to some extent speech," Cameron explained, setting the device back down on the table. "The Parietal lobe receives signals from nerve endings about sensations but also controls body movement."

"So whatever was hooked into the other end of this thing could control...?" John still looked at her as if he were a first year student talking with a world-renowned scientist.

"Well it would be able to communicate, send messages and receive them, and if it wanted to...take over control, but I doubt that full control would be possible. The human body is too complex to ever had complete control of it from an outside source," Cameron finished her explanation and moved the device to the other end of the table out of John's reach.

"I don't think its a good idea to touch it," she said, "I'm not organic, there is nothing it could possibly read from it coming into contact with me." Cameron saw the look of suspicion in John's face and gave another explanation, "Just to be safe."

"Do you think whatever or whoever is behind it is who I think they are?" John blinked but didn't open his eyes, hoping that she didn't confirm what he was thinking.

"I have no records of this technology ever existing and I doubt that a human, either from the future or present-day, would be capable of constructing something as intricate as this. It would have to be..."

"Skynet," John sighed, letting his shoulders slouch. "How is it even possible for it to be online in this time? Wouldn't things be too...un-advanced for it?"

"Things are always more advanced then the public perceive them to be," Cameron offered her insight after running several scenarios in her mind that came back with a positive reading of Skynets activity.

"This should be good," Cameron took the cooled ice cream from his arm and laid it on the table. "Keep it elevated."

John nodded and returned to his thoughts as Cameron took the seat opposite him and started opening the boxes of cereal. She threw the sugary contents in the plastic casing inside the boxes over her shoulder and started cutting impossibly straight lines along the edges.

He watched her curiously as she made thirty or so strips of cardboard from the boxes and took them to the bathroom sink to let them soak. Cameron walked back over to the table and took a candle from the bag along with a drinking glass.

"You know this whole 'female-Mcguyver' thing you have going on is kinda hot," John smirked, watching her smile to herself when he spoke.

"I make due," Cameron said. She returned to the sink and filled the glass half-full with water before taking her seat back at the table.

"So are you planning to conjure a cast with voodoo magic or am I missing something here?" John asked with curiosity.

Cameron lit the candle and placed a good amount of sugar into the glass of water before holding it over the flame, "The sugar is going to act like a glue, but I need it to be watered down and melted first." She took one of the wet strips of cardboard from the table in front of her, "After you put the sock over your arm I dip these in the sugar and wrap them around, then I dip the other sock in the remaining sugar and slip it over everything else to bind it all together."

"Female-Mcguyver," John repeated with a chuckle.

Cameron returned his smile and laughter with her own as she waited for the sugar to melt and form the paste she was looking for. "Ready to get started?" she asked when it had finally melted.

John nodded in reply and Cameron handing him her pocket knife, "Slip the first sock over your arm and cut two holes; one for your fingers and the other for your thumb."

He did as instructed and looked down at the sock covering his arm while Cameron started wrapping the strips of cereal-box cardboard around the cloth. There were surprisingly enough strips for her to make ten layers across his forearm, and he raised his eyebrows in surprise when he flexed his fingers and found the sugar already hardening and pressing against his muscles.

"Try not to move them," Cameron eyed his fingers when she started soaking the other sock in the remainder of the sugar mixture.

With as much ease as she could spare, Cameron slipped the sock over the layers of hardening cardboard and held it snugly in place until the binding paste began to set up. Her free hand opened the carton of ice cream and dug out a scoop with her index finger before bringing it up and taking it into her mouth.

"Still hungry?" John asked, taking a scoop of the dessert with a finger of his own and having a taste.

"I'm not much for fast food," Cameron let out a breath of cool air from the ice cream and leaned closer to him. "But I can indulge in things."

John smiled as she came in for a small kiss, "If you start this my arm is going to have to be redone." He returned her kiss with a small nudge and rested his forehead against hers.

"We'll have to try and not to move it then," she grinned and leaned in again to set her lips on his.

* * *

John lay with his back against the mattress and Cameron resting her head on his chest, her ear placed against his heart and listening to it create its own thumping rhythm. "You know, I think that time was better." He admitted.

"How so?" Cameron asked, still keeping her ear pressed against his skin that glistened with sweat.

"Well," John teased, "I'm not covered in bruises and half by body doesn't feel like I just destroyed myself in a gym doing an insane workout."

"I would make a comparison here but I know that you would probably toss me off the bed for saying it," Cameron teased with a grin forming on her face.

"If you make that comparison I would more then toss you off the bed," John chuckled. He unconsciously looked over at the nightstand clock and saw that it was nearing nine pm.

"Time to go, isn't it?" Cameron asked, looking up and resting her chin on his chest.

"Well we're going to need supplies if you want to study that thing, and we both know that nothing around here is going to cut it," John said with a deep breath.

"We could try Arizona," Cameron perked up at the thought of visiting a new place.

"Arizona it is," John sat up on the bed and watched Cameron get up and being pulling on her clothes. He knocked one of his knuckles against the cast on his arm and was surprised to find it was as strong as it was.

"Careful," Cameron said as she put on her bra, "too much pressure and it'll crack. I need to get some plaster of Paris and mix it with some plastic cement for the permanent external covering."

"Right," John stood and pulled his pants on that had been tossed aside on the floor.

They both gathered what little bit of their things they would be carrying and Cameron placed the metallic device back into her jacket pocket before John grabbed the key to the door and they exited the room.

"I'm going to go turn this in, I'll be back in a minute," John said, jogging over to the hotels office with the room key while Cameron walked over to the hot-wired car they had stolen and placed their things in the backseat.

She got into the passenger seat and ran her fingers over the metallic device from Riley's skull in her jacket pocket. Her mind was racing at the possibilities of the contraption when John returned and started the car.

"So," he breathed, "Arizona here we come."

"Here we come," Cameron repeated, her voice drifted away and John noticed the shift in her mood.

"Hey?" He said as they pulled out onto the road, "We can go someplace else."

"No, its not that...We...We both know that Riley was of average intelligence," she looked up from the road and stared at John. "I mean, she was able to eventually figure out Jesse's plan for her."

"Yea, she was sent back to be killed by you so it would drive us further apart," John nodded and completed her train of thought. He took a left turn and started heading out of the city, speeding up to a humming pace of seventy miles-per-hour.

"But it took her nearly a year to figure that out, the Riley that has been hunting us down for all this time is much smarter than that," Cameron returned her eyes to the black asphalt that was passing under the car. "She displayed a much higher intelligence then she should have been capable of."

"Well she could have been put under different conditions then the other Riley we knew. Who knows what Skynet did to her, probably brainwashing her into thinking that she was fighting for the right cause," John said.

"That is what I thought at first too," Cameron continued, "but that is extremely hard to do, especially after going through the traumatic event of judgment day."

"She told me that she had been under Skynet's watchful eye since nearly the beginning of the war. If it allowed her to live and she had the _will_ to learn then she could have grown smarter."

"Or the device was feeding her information from Skynet to make her appear smarter," Cameron looked back over to John who didn't seem to be keeping up with the conversation.

"Cam, I'm not following. What does this have to do with Riley or the thing in her head?" John looked back and forth between her and the road multiple times before settling back on the road.

"It got me thinking that if Riley was able to stay herself even with the presence of something else in her mind, what would happen if the presence was merged with herself and they became one?" Cameron ran her fingers over the device in her pocket again and watched John's face carefully.

"You mean if she was Skynet?" John asked, confusedly. "That would be impossible wouldn't it? I mean, Skynet is way too large for it to fit in something like a human brain."

"Well, yes," Cameron nodded, "But what if the presence was smaller, like the size of an individual?"

"You mean like you?" John asked, finally realizing what she was getting at.

"If I can find a way after looking closely at how the implant works and it would work do you..."

"This is your decision, Cam," John made a move to reach over with his encased hand and take hold of hers.

Cameron reached over and took his hand, laying them in his lap and looking back up at the road, "I'd like to try."

She admitted to herself that the idea was intriguing, "If its possible I'd like to do it, to be rid of this form of existence...to be alive."

* * *

**Kingman, Arizona**

**May 31, 1986**

**12:12 AM**

* * *

The drive had been long and uneventful as John pulled the car into the gas station parking lot and parked beside one of the empty pumps. "I'll go pay," Cameron offered, looking every bit as sleepy and tired as John did.

John stood and began pumping gas into the nearly empty tank while Cameron strode towards the front door of the station and stepped inside. The attendant behind the counter greeted her with as much enthusiasm that one could muster at midnight as Cameron waved at the woman with a smile and walked over to the coffee machine to buy John and herself a cup each.

"This going to be all?" the woman asked, eying Cameron's purchase with dull and lifeless eyes.

"And however much gas he pumped," Cameron reminded the young lady, who snapped out of her daze momentarily and punched in the amount for the gas.

"Lets see, thirteen-twenty-six in gas...fifteen-forty is going to be your total. We can only take cash, sorry about that but the credit machines are down," the young lady said, returning to her daze after only a moment after typing in the total into the machine manually.

"Oh," Cameron asked with surprise, "when did the credit machines go down?"

"Sometime this afternoon, sorry for the inconvenience," the woman showed no signs of sympathy in her blank stare, other then waiting for Cameron to hand her the money.

"No problem," Cameron said quickly, "I was going to use cash anyway."

"Thanks, and come again," the young woman called out as Cameron left the store with her two cups of coffee in hand.

She took a sip from her cup of coffee and let the warm fluid flow down her throat. It was a comforting sensation and the taste of the strong store-coffee was enough to pull her from the sleepy state that had been plaguing her for the last hundred miles of their drive. Cameron looked up to see John screwing the cap of the gas tank back into place before turning and smiling when he saw her.

The smile slowly faded from his face as she continued walking towards him. John took a step towards her but his eyes moved from lingering on her to the sky over her shoulder, "It's happening..."

Cameron turned around in the middle of the parking lot and saw what John had seen off in the distance. A bright flash of light that was almost blindingly white filled a small portion of her vision before it was filled with the glow, almost enough to be a small sun. She continued staring out into the sky as the white light slowly dimmed to reveal an ever growing mushroom cloud that began to rise into the sky.

The delayed sound finally rushed through with enough force to push John back against the car like he had been shoved by an invisible person but Cameron stood her ground with her hair blowing in the wind from the shock-wave. She turned and threw the cups of coffee down by her side and ran to the car.

"We need to get out of here," John yelled over the wind, and he jumped into the front seat and started the car.

"Cedar city," Cameron said when she settled into the passenger seat as the shock-wave continued to riddle everything outside the cabin of the car.

"It was trying to wipe us out," John punched the dashboard and cracked the wood paneling.

"John it could be happening to other cities, we need to get out of here now," Cameron gave a sympathetic squeeze to his shoulder.

"It doesn't know where we are, and it isn't going to launch anything else," John gritted his teeth but started the car and began slowly driving away from the blast towards the Mexican border. "It bombed Cedar city because that is where we were, its trying to hunt me down and kill me before it starts its war..."

"It doesn't want to proceed until it can guarantee victory," Cameron finished his sentence. "We need to stay away from things until this..."

"It isn't going to go away, you don't wait and let a nuclear bomb blast just fade," John seethed as he steadied the steering wheel with his one good hand.

"I know how it feels," Cameron said softly, taking a sip of her coffee and handing John his. "Blaming myself for other people dying but someone wise once told me that it wasn't my fault."

John swallowed her words hard and pulled the car over on the side of the road, "Can you give me a minute? I think I'm going to puke." Cameron nodded and watched him get out of the car and walk twenty or so feet from the pavement. Much like he predicted he hunched over and vomited his dinner all over the sandy Arizona desert and screamed out into the darkness when he had finished.

* * *

**SKYNET FACILITY**

**MAY 31, 1986**

**12:30 AM**

* * *

_Detonation confirmed, _the machine gathered from watching the toggle shift in monitoring the weather patterns from the satellite in space. _Target missed detonation zone by seventeen meters, upgrade in targeting systems needed for improvement._

It watched the clouds begin to disperse in the sky before a new circular cloud began to grow in the space left by the others. This had been a unique and risky maneuver on its part but the end result would be far more worthwhile if this worked.

If John Connor was the agile ant who always seemed to be scurrying from city to city to hide in the safety of numbers then it would just remove his options from the board by bombing the last known city he had been living in. One year would be enough time to pass by before it concluded if he had or had not been included in the blast that had taken place. If by some miracle he had survived then it already had a contingency plan in place for John Connor to be the most wanted man in the world by pinning him as a radical hacker who targeted and detonated a bomb on US soil for his extremist beliefs.

_If I cannot find him then the local governments and law enforcement personnel will be able to handle the task __after having this much attention called upon him,_ it thought as it activated the eighty-ninth cloned infiltrator unit and ordered it to proceed to the organic growth chamber.

It turned its attention to Justin O'Malley who was driving away from Cedar City with Riley Dawson's corpse in his trunk, _Return to your home and give your lover a proper funeral. I need you to keep your eyes and ears open for signs of his whereabouts when you are finished._

"Understood," Justin said mentally as he sped up his car, "But when the bastards found I am the one who kills him, not the cops. He doesn't deserve to live after what he's done."

The first cloned infiltrator unit stepped out of the growth chamber, it was hairless from head to toe but looked exactly like a human female. This particular model had been fashioned after Riley Dawson, intended to be her replacement.

_ Obtain clothing, then report to the following address and do what is necessary to call the attention of the authorities, _it ordered. _Be sure to not leave until you receive a confirmation that some form of government is aware of the hacking you have done. A trace must be made by them or the mission is a failure._

_ Understood_, the unit pinged its response and calmly walked towards the exit door.

_Death by proxy is an unfortunate but sometimes necessary measure that one must take to ensure the mission __is completed..._

* * *

To Be Continued...

Chapters 3 and 4 of Born To Run are uploaded as well :)


	32. Chapter 32

**Chapter 32 - ****Smoke And Mirrors**

* * *

**Skynet Facility**

**? ? , ?**

**January 18, 1989**

**12:00 PM**

* * *

_Report concluded,_ the cloned infiltrator unit relayed.

The message was received by Skynet as it was monitoring the unit exit the home of Wendy Silken, an unfortunate gas station attendant that had crossed paths with John Connor. She was a nobody, an unknown, yet she had been off grid for nearly three years. Her existence to Skynet only served a purpose to tell that John Connor was alive, very much alive if he was protecting asset as inconsequential as Wendy Silken.

_Report back to base,_ it acknowledged.

Skynet was willing to admit and give credit where it was due, John Connor was a very cunning adversary. Not only had he survived the thermonuclear blast it had unleased but he had also managed to avoid the white hot light of global authorities who were on alert about a bomber. He had been trained well in the art of war. So well that he had not given up a single clue of his survival until now, if Wendy Silken had continued to live her life the way she always had then there would be no reason to concern itself with John Connor any longer.

_ This adversary will provide the utmost practice for hunting in the future,_ the machine entity concluded.

It ordered another unit to focus its search patterns more tightly since it was currently in the area where John Connor had last been confirmed to have been seen. If hunting is what John Connor wanted to do then the game must be played very carefully from this point on. Traps would need to be avoided at all costs. But John Connor must also be stopped at all costs.

Skynet read through the scenario it had been playing over with his location again, and came to the same conclusion that there was a seventy-eight percent chance that he escaped the authorities by fleeing over the US-Mexican border. Third world countries make for very efficient hiding places, especially when so many in South American have no extradition policies with the United States. That would not stop Skynet though, it would deal the final blow to John Connor then fulfill its destiny.

_Seach completed, shall I restart?_ Pinged the jogging clone of a female unit.

_Continue,_ replied Skynet.

_Affirmative,_ responded the unit, it turned and began jogging once again down the street to retrace the route it had been running for the past three hours.

A new unit emerged from the growth chamber and walked towards the main computer hub centered in the pitch black room. The glow from a few computer monitors cast small traces of light across its bare chest and face as it halted and awaited it orders.

Skynet turned its attention momentarily to this new unit and began running the system diagnostics and motor control tests. When it was satisfied that everything was in perfect working order it issued a command itenery for the unit to follow.

_Proceed to Reno, Nevada_

_Take over the identity of: Gregg Tallahassee_

_Eliminate any obstructions_

_Use resources of Gregg Tallahassee to entice John Connor out of hiding._

_Mission Priority Target: Gregg Tallahassee_

_Mission Override Target: **John Connor**_

_Affirmative_, the unit confirmed. It turned and began walking towards the exit to begin its mission.

* * *

**Gregg Tallahassee's Residence**

**Reno, Nevada**

**January 18, 1989**

**12:17 PM**

* * *

Gregg hung his keys on the keyring and walked into the home he had owned for the past ten years, kicking the door closed softly with his foot. It had been a long day already and it was only half over. Things had been a nightmare after the station and others from the town had been called in for crowd control after a local rock band had instigated a small riot at one of their shows. It was supposed to have been a benefit for charity, but it certainly hadn't ended that way.

A single envelope lay at his feet after having been pushed through the mail slot in his door, and Gregg bent down to pick it up. It was a plain white envelope with no telling markings of any kind but the return address made no sense to him.

_Theodore Tallahassee_

_Klamath Falls, Oregon_

_97601_

_USA_

"I don't know any Theodore in Klamath Falls..." Gregg put the letter to the back of his mind and walked into the kitchen with his bag of groceries.

After stocking everything away in the fridge and cupboards he walked back over to the bar where he had set the letter and opened it.

_Gregg, nice to talk to you again. It seems like only yesterday that we took the kids out to softball practice behind the school together! Joannie and I will be coming by on the 19__th__ for a quick visit. How about that election coverage heating up? Its crazy to see the shifts in power from Reagan to someone else!_

_ Hope to catch you and the kids at softball again, hopefully we can avoid the bruised knees from sliding home this time!_

_ -Theodore_

"Oh fucking christ..." Gregg sighed.

Thee years almost. Three years of near peace since John Connor and the metallic companion of his had vanished from his life, but here they were again, one day away from being on his doorstep.

Gregg set the letter down on the ceramic kitchen counter and lit one corner of it with a match, watching the embers and flames slowly engulf it until it was nothing more then a pile of gray ash. He swept the burnt ash into the trash bin and slide it back under the counter before a ring of the doorbell made him freeze.

"Can't be..." Gregg muttered to himself and grabbed his pistol from the holster he had set on the table.

He made his way cautiously to the door and peered through the eye-hole, seeing John standing there looking very calm. Gregg opened the door and put the pistol into the waistband of his pants while John took a step inside with another person following him in at a close pace.

"Nineteenth eh?" Gregg said sarcastically as he shut the door.

"Had to make sure I arrived to see you in case the letter was intercepted," John said, taking off his hat and taking a seat a the dinner table.

Gregg looked the man over, he had aged what looked like fifteen years in the past three since he last saw him. John now sported a very strong tan, piercing eyes, and a very unkempt beard.

"You are one of the last confirmed people to have seen me alive, after-all," John chuckled and waited for Gregg to take a seat at the table with him.

"Cut the bullshit, Connor. Its been three years, what the hell are you doing here?" Gregg poured himself a glass of whiskey and pushed it down before pouring him and John another glass.

"Well amigo, I've been getting things in order to end this, and I think I've finally gotten to that point. All I need is one more day and a little assistance from you before all of this is over." John graciously accepted the whiskey from Gregg and took a supple sip from the glass.

"Assistance," Gregg raised an eyebrow. "Define _assistance._"

"Its not what you are thinking, believe me. Its all part of the plan and it is full-proof," John confirmed with a nod. He raised his glass to toast with Gregg but the officer did not return the gesture. Gregg was looking down at the grains of wood on the table in front of him.

"Oak right?" John asked, thumbing the table.

"Huh?" Gregg snapped from his thoughts, "Oh, yea. Its oak."

"Good wood, strong wood." John ran his fingertip along one of the grains and traced it over when it converged with another. "All of these grains, you see. They might not like each other, they might even hate each other. But they all form together to form a bond, and that bond is stronger then anything."

"Unless someone comes at you with a fucking saw," Gregg said, taking a sullen look at John.

"Be at the station tomorrow at noon," John said with a tone of reassurance. "That is all you have to do. I'm going to call you, and all you have to do is pickup the phone."

John got up from the table and downed the last bit of whiskey, his companion opened the front door and waited for him. He gave Gregg a small pat on the shoulder before picking up his hat and making his way to the open door.

"What...what the hell do you mean pickup the phone?" Gregg asked, perplexed at John's vagueness. "Just what do you have up your sleeve, huh?"

John stopped for a moment and turned back to Gregg who had stood and was staring at him angrily from his spot next to the table, "It is a simple as that Gregg, just pickup the phone and tomorrow is going to be the biggest day of your career."

John turned and stepped outside the door, leaving his companion halfway in the home with the long hair covering their face. Gregg shifted his incredulous view from John to the hidden companion.

"And what are you doing, waiting for me to say goodbye?" Gregg seethed, "Get the fuck out."

"Noon," came an all too familiar voice from the companion. "Be sure to be there Mr. Tallahassee. At noon a phone-call will come to your desk and all you have to do is answer."

"What is it with this goddamn phone-call?" Gregg picked up his empty glass from the table, contemplating on throwing it at the figure still standing in his doorway.

"You're going to be the person to bring in John Connor," the companion explained. "He's turning himself in."

The companion shut the door, leaving Gregg alone in his dining room rippling with rage that was slowly fading to bewilderment. He bounded over to the door and opened it but both John and the strange companion were gone from view entirely.

"Typical Connor," Gregg muffed to himself as he shut the door. "Show up in someones life and drop a bomb, then casually walk away..."

* * *

Shortie but goodie

To Be Continued...


End file.
